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BY REV. WILLIAM M. TAYLOR, D.D., LLD. 



LIMITATIONS OF LIFE, and other Sermons. 

With a fine portrait on steel, of the author. 
Crown octavo, cloth. Fourth Edition $1.75 

CONTRARY WINDS, and other Sermons. Crown 

octavo,, cloth. Third Edition 1.75 

THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR expound- 
ed and illustrated. Crown octavo, cloth .... 1.75 

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steel, from a painting of Lord Somervi lie's. 1 vol. 
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THE 



PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR 



EXPOUNDED AND ILLUSTRATED 



/ 



BY 



WILLIAM M. TAYLOR, D.D., LL.D. 

PASTOR OF THE BROADWAY TABERNACLE, NEW YORK CITY 









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NEW YORK 
A. C. ARMSTRONG & SON 

714 Beoadway • 
1886 






Copyright, 1886, 
By A. C. ARMSTRONG & SON. 



RAND. AVERT, & COMPANY, 

ELECTROTTPERS AND PRINTERS, 

BOSTON. 



To the Members of 

W$z Broatifoag Eaftemacle Congregation, 

New York. 
My dear Friends, — 

Permit me to inscribe to you these discourses, delivered in 
your hearing, and now published at the request of many among 
you. In doing so, let me express my gratitude to God for the 
unbroken peace and the unalloyed affection which has existed 
between us from the beginning of our relationship until now, 
and my prayer that he may continue to bless us with that 
prosperity which springs from his presence with us, and his 
power upon us. 

Believe me, 

Your friend and pastor, 

WM. M. TAYLOR. 

New York, November, 1886. 

5 West Thirty-fifth Street. 



PBEFACE. 



The parables of our Lord have always had a special 
attraction for students of the Gospels, and there are 
probably more works devoted to their exposition than 
to that of any other portion of the Saviour's teach- 
ings. In adding another to the number, I can claim 
only such originality as may be fairly accounted for by 
what astronomers have called the "personal equation;" 
and the result may be a further illustration of the 
many-sidedness of these exquisite stories. To Arch- 
bishop Trench, who more than any other English writer 
has brought Patristic lore to bear upon the illustration 
of the parables, every later author must express his 
peculiar obligations ; but the recent works of Professor 
Bruce and Siegfried Goebel have broken new ground 
in this department, and my aim has been to turn their 
fruitful suggestions to good homiletical account. The 
little volumes of Dr. Dods — only the first of which 
was in my hands when these discourses were prepared 
— are full of golden nuggets ; and the Expositions of 
William Arnot are characterized by the masculine 



vi PBEFACE. 

sense, rich Christian experience, and striking illustra- 
tions for which he was so remarkable. But the present 
work, while more or less indebted in different respects 
to all these authors, will be found to be in others in- 
dependent of them all. It is given to the press at 
the urgent request of many who heard the discourses 
when delivered ; and, such as it is, it is laid at the feet 
of Him whose sayings it is designed to illustrate, with 
the prayer that he would use it for the glory of his 
name, in the edification of his Church, and the con- 
version of men. 

WM. M. TAYLOR. 



CONTENTS. 



PAGE 

I. Introductory 1 

II. The Four Kinds of Soil, 17 

III. The Tares, and The Drag-net .... 38 

IV. The Mustard-Seed, and The Leaven . . 54 
V. The Hidden Treasure, and The Pearl of 

Great Price 70 

VI. The Unmerciful Servant 86 

VII. The Laborers in the Vineyard . . . 104 

VIII. The Two Sons " . .121 

IX. The Wicked Husbandmen . .... 137 

X. The Koyal Marriage-Feast . . . . . 149 

XL The Ten Virgins 164 

XII. The Intrusted Talents . . . . .180 

XIII. The Growth of the Seed 196 

XIV. The Two Debtors ....... 210 

XV. The Good Samaritan 226 

XVI. The Friend at Midnight 243 

XVII. The Foolish Eich Man 259 

XVIII. The Barren Fig-Tree 276 

XIX. The Great Supper. 290 

XX. The Lost Sheep 305 

XXL The Lost Coin ... o .... 320 

vii 



Vih CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

XXII. The Prodigal Son . 337 

XXIII. The Elder Brother 356 

XXIV. The Prudent Steward ...... 371 

XXY. The Kich Man and Lazarus .... 387 

XXVI. The Ploughing Servant 402 

XXVII. The Importunate Widow, and The Pharisee 

and the Publican 415 

XXVIII. The Pounds 431 



THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



I. 

INTRODUCTORY. 

"He spake many things unto them in parables." — Matt. xiii. 3. 

As we enter upon the exposition of the Saviour's 
parables, we are met by two or three preliminary ques- 
tions, the answers to which will determine, to a consid- 
erable extent, the character and quality of our work. 
To the consideration and settlement of these, therefore, 
we shall devote this introductory discourse. 

I. First, what is a parable ? In the New Testament, 
two Greek words have been rendered by this one 
English term. The one of these, irapot/xia, is almost 
peculiar to the fourth Evangelist, seeing that he uses it 
four times, while it occurs only once elsewhere ; to wit, 
in 2 Pet. ii. 22, where it is translated "proverb." Lit- 
erally it signifies "something by the way;" and in its 
secondary sense it denotes a figurative discourse or 
dark saying, in which more is meant than meets the ear, 
and into which much valuable though hidden meaning 
has been closely packed. The other and more common 
term, TrapafioXri, which, curiously enough, is never used 
by John, while it is the only one employed by the 

1 



2 TTIE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

other Evangelists, is simply the English word in Greek 
letters. It comes from a verb which signifies to throw 
or place side by side, and denotes a placing of one thing 
beside another for the purpose of comparison, or, more 
generally, an utterance which involves a comparison. 
It is used by the sacred writers both in a wider and in 
a narrower sense. In the wider sense, it is emplo}^ed 
sometimes to denote an adage, or proverb properly so 
called ; 2 sometimes to signify a sentiment so briefly and 
darkly worded as not to be easily understood ; 2 some- 
times to designate a pithy instruction couched in the 
form of an aphorism; 3 and sometimes to describe a 
lesson which is confirmed by a simile drawn from na- 
ture. 4 But, in its more restricted sense, it is the name 
given to a connected narrative, whether of events in 
human life or of a process in nature, by which some 
great spiritual truth is illustrated or enforced. It is 
not a mere simile, which may be expressed in a single 
clause ; or even a detailed comparison of one thing to 
another: but a little history, which might be read 
merely for its own sake, but which, as used by the 
Great Teacher, was made the vehicle of instruction or 
warning, of comfort or condemnation. The little girl 
was very near the mark, when she said that a parable 
is "an earthly story with a heavenly meaning;" and 
we may not be far wrong if we define it to be a nar- 
rative true to nature or to life, used for the purpose of 
conveying spiritual truth to the mind of the hearer. 
Its force depends on the analogy which exists between 
God's works in nature and providence, and his opera- 
tions in grace. The world of nature came at first 
from, and is still sustained by, the hand of Him who 
formed the human soul ; and the administration of 

1 Luke iv. 23. 2 Matt. xv. 15. 3 Luke xiv. 7. 4 Matt. xxiv. 32. 



INTRODUCTORY. 3 

providence is carried on by Him who gave to us the 
revelation of his will in the Sacred Scriptures, and 
provided for us salvation through his Son. We may 
expect, therefore, to find a principle of unity running 
through all these three departments of his administra- 
tion; and a knowledge of his operations in any one 
of them may be helpful to us in our investigation of 
the others. 

The use which was made of this truth by Bishop 
Butler, in his great work on " The Analogy of Religion, 
Natural and Revealed, to the Constitution and Course 
of Nature," is known to every student of the Christian 
evidences. Postulating that the course and constitu- 
tion of nature are maintained by God, he shows that 
the difficulties which emerge in revelation are precisely 
parallel to those which meet us in nature and in provi- 
dence, and draws these two conclusions : namely, that, 
as we have met difficulties in these other departments, 
we ought not to be surprised to meet similar difficulties 
in revelation, coming as that does from the same 
divine Author ; and that, as in the one case the diffi- 
culties are not regarded as sufficient to invalidate our 
belief that the constitution and course of nature are 
from God^ so in the other they ought not to be allowed 
to stand in the way of our acceptance of the Scriptures 
as from him. The argument is irrefutable by those 
who admit the postulate with which he sets out ; and 
they who reject it at all can do so consistently, only 
by accepting, as unhappily James Mill did, the dreary, 
unrelieved darkness of absolute atheism. 

The existence of this analogy lies also at the root of 
the finest poetry, and accounts for the effect produced 
upon us by the revelation of those hidden harmonies 
which genius has discovered and revealed. Not sel- 



4 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

dom, too, the physical philosopher has been led hj the 
same principle to some of his grandest discoveries ; and, 
as in the case of the great German, the insight of the 
poet has been combined with — has, indeed, contributed 
to — the eminence of the man of science. Thus all 
things are double, one against another. The external 
is the mirror in which we may behold the internal and 
spiritual ; and Milton was not wrong when he said, — 

" What if earth 
Be but the shadow of heaven and things therein, 
Each to the other like, more than on earth is thought ? " 

Hence a true parable is something more than a mere 
felicitous illustration. It is an outward symbol of an 
inward reality. It is not the creation of a new simi- 
larity, but the revelation of a similarity that has always 
existed ; not the putting into nature or into life of that 
which was not formerly in them, but the bringing-out 
from them of that which they have always contained, 
and which is indeed their deepest and their truest signifi- 
cance. Trench is not overstating the case, therefore, 
when he says of the Saviour's parables, that "their 
power lies in the harmony unconsciously felt by all 
men, and which all deeper minds have delighted to 
trace, between the natural and spiritual worlds, so that 
analogies from the first are felt to be something more 
than illustrations happily but yet arbitrarily chosen. 
They are arguments, and may be alleged as witnesses ; 
the world of nature being throughout a witness for the 
world of spirit, proceeding from the same hand, grow- 
ing out of the same root, and being constituted for that 
very end." 1 

1 Note3 on the Parables, by Archbishop Trench, pp. 12, 13. 



INTRODUCTORY. 5 

Herein, too, lies the root of the difference between 
the parable, strictly so called, and the fable. No doubt, 
as has been often pointed out, the fable finds its sphere 
in the lower department of merely worldly prudence, 
while that of the parable is in the enforcement of the 
highest spiritual truths. But that to which I direct 
attention more particularly now is the fact that the 
author of the fable puts into nature something that 
is not originally there, in order that he may draw out 
again the lesson which he designs to teach ; while the 
setter-forth of a parable relates a narrative which in all 
its parts is true to nature, and finds in that nature, 
when rightly interpreted, the higher principle which he 
seeks to enforce. The fabulist does violence to nature, 
by transferring human motives and actions to trees and 
animals, in order that he may make them the mouth- 
pieces of that shrewdness which he does not care to 
utter in his own proper personality. Thus, in Jotham's 
fable of the trees choosing a king, 1 he attributes the 
actions of human beings to the vine, the olive, and 
the fig-tree ; and the lesson which he brings out of the 
whole story is one which he had himself first put into 
it. In a parable, on the other hand, there is nothing 
contrary to the truth of nature : every thing is in char- 
acter ; and the moral is not one which has been thrust 
into it for the time being and for a particular purpose, 
but one which has all along been in that aspect of human 
life, and that process of nature, and which waited only 
for the eye that could see it, and the voice that could 
reveal it to the world. So as science advances, and 
history rolls on in its course, the materials for parable 
are increased; and those who keep abreast of their 
times may find ever-new analogies wherewith to attract 

i Judg. ix. 8-2Q. 



6 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the attention of their fellows, and illustrate to them the 
eternal verities of the gospel. 

But observe : to do all this, the parable must be true 
to nature and to life. If it be not, then it is no proper 
parable ; the analogy is forced, and the lesson conveyed 
is not one which God meant to teach, but only one 
which the human speaker has himself devised. This 
must never be lost sight of ; and yet, at the same time, 
it must never be misunderstood. For it does not imply 
that the narrative in a parable must be the history of 
an actual occurrence. It may or it may not be so. 
The essential thing is, that, whether fact or fiction, it 
shall be true. It may indeed seem paradoxical when I 
speak of fiction as being true ; but the proper antithesis 
to fiction is fact, not truth, and a thing may be true 
without being fact. Thus, to take a modern instance, 
we may find mistakes in matters of fact in some of the 
historical plays of Shakspeare ; but still no mere chroni- 
cler of facts has given us any thing like such a truthful 
idea of the life of the periods which he has delineated, 
as he has furnished in these dramas. So the story of 
the Prodigal Son may have been a history of literal facts. 
There is nothing in it that renders that impossible. 
But it may also be, as I believe it is, a fiction ; and as 
such it has the truth of an ideal which corresponds to 
many different reals. Every thing in it is to the life ; 
and as each person reads it, he may have some case in 
his mind, distinct from that in the mind of every other, 
to which the description exactly answers. Putting 
together, then, the different things which we have 
emphasized, we may say that a parable is the narrative 
— fictitious or otherwise — of a scene in human life or a 
process in nature ; yet true in its representations either 
of the one or of the other, and having under it a spirit- 



INTRODUCTORY. 7 

ual lesson : or, to repeat the little girl's definition, it is 
" an earthly story with a heavenly meaning." 

II. But now let us ask, in the second place, why the 
Lord Jesus used parables in his discourses. And to 
that we may answer, first of all, that he employed this 
form of instruction as a means of attracting attention. 
Every one knows how the interest of young people is 
awakened and sustained by the telling of "a story." 
We can all remember how in our early days our minds 
were fascinated and our imaginations were filled by 
those classics of the nursery, as I may call them, which 
were read to us by our seniors, and which we eagerly 
received, without any questioning on our part as to 
their truth, or any consciousness, either in the reader or 
the hearers, of any hidden meaning lurking beneath their 
incidents. But in this respect we are all only children 
of a larger growth, as is made abundantly evident by 
the fact that when a public speaker descends from 
abstract reasoning to concrete illustration, and clinches 
his argument by a pat and parallel anecdote, an imme- 
diate hush of eager interest stills his audience into a 
breathless silence, which is broken only at the close by 
the outburst of irrepressible applause. Now, knowing 
well this peculiarity of our nature, the Lord secured 
the attention of his hearers by the beautiful parables 
which he introduced into his discourses. And the 
effect was heightened by his selection, for this purpose, 
of the scenes, incidents, and objects with which men 
were familiar in common life. He never introduced 
recondite subjects, or went out of the region with 
which his hearers were acquainted; but he lifted up 
that which lay at his hand, making it magnetic in its 
attractiveness, and luminous in its application. This, 



TEE PAYABLES OE OUR SAVIOUB 

i his popularity as a 

r. Hm - ^oing forth to sow; the fisherman 

bo the lake ; the woman kneading her 

ing her house in search of a piece of 

t which she had lost ; the growth of the mustard- 
from a seed; the shepherd going after his 

sheep: the father receiving back his 1 ng-L:s: = n : :"_-? 
1 incidents of a marriage procession ; the hir- 
ing _f laborers in the market-place., — all were turned 
by ln'm to profitable account And this helps to explain 
it came, that, with a Joseph and a Mcodemus 
among his disciples, it was also true that "the common 
people heard him gladly ; w for here, in their liking for 
■ ■ :. st »ry " lying in the sphere of daily life, ** the rich and 
the poor meet together," and both alike are attracted 
by the spell of its influence. 

But another reason why our Lord used parables in 
his teaching was to prevent his auditors from being 
repelled by a too sudden revelation, either of his pur- 
posc or of his message. His hearers were largely preju- 
diced against the truth which he came to teach ; and by 
means of these delightful stories he secured the presen- 
tation of it to their minds in a form which, for the time 
at least, disarmed antagonism. He had to reveal his 
truth to men "as the" were able to be:.: it, and so 
he gave it to them first under the guise of parables, 
me reas m which underlies the fact that the gos- 
pel dispensation as a whole was preceded hy the Jew- 
ish — which with its types and shadows was just one 
t parable — is to be found at the heart of our Sav- 
iour's emplovmeii: : this mode of instruction. The 
race had to be prepared for the fuller revelation which 
was coming, by the pictorial representation which i 
before. And what was true .: the race as a whole 



INTRODUCTORY. 9 

is true also of the individual. The old heathen myth 
which represented that the sight of the unveiled image 
of Truth, at Sais, would smite a man into death or into 
blindness, has its full interpretation here ; and parable 
was the veil which Jesus put over the face of truth, to 
secure its safer perception by those who listened to his 
words. Had he spoken plainly, they would have been 
largely repelled; but by his use of analogy he pre- 
pared the way for their ultimate reception of his teach- 
ing. Thus, to take but one illustration : the Jews of 
his day had set their hearts upon a literal restoration 
of their earthly kingdom. Indeed, they fully expected 
that as the fulfilment of their ancient oracles. Now, if 
Jesus, at the beginning of his ministry, had affirmed 
as plainly as he did at its close, to Pilate, who had 
no such prejudice, that " his kingdom was not of this 
world," they would have given him no further heed. 
But in his wisdom he veiled that fact beneath the many 
parables which tell of " the kingdom of heaven ; " and 
in that form it was preserved for his genuine disciples, 
while it was hidden for the time from his antagonists. 
This seems to me to be the true explanation of the 
somewhat difficult passage wherein the Lord himself 
describes his purpose in the use of parables, to his fol- 
lowers. He says, " Therefore speak I to them in para- 
bles, because they seeing see not, and hearing they 
hear not, and do not understand." l Had he spoken 
plainly, they would have been stirred to immediate 
antagonism, and the crisis of the cross would have come 
before his personal ministry had been well begun. But 
by the adoption of the parabolic method he postponed 
the inevitable catastrophe, and so secured time for the 
education of his apostles, and for the communication to 

i Matt. xiii. 13. 



10 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

them, and through them to the world at large, of the 
true principles of his gospel. 

But, as another illustration of the same sort, I may 
refer to his parables of reproof. By his employment of 
the story, he made the severest exposure of the conduct 
of his antagonists, before they were aware of his design ; 
and so secured that they were put to confusion, nay, 
oftentimes convicted out of their own mouths. You 
remember how Nathan did with David in the matter of 
the Psalmist's great iniquity. 1 Had the prophet gone 
in to the king, and directly and immediately denounced 
his guilt, while at the same time he attempted to pro- 
nounce sentence upon him, and to declare that punish- 
ment would surely follow, it is at least questionable if 
he would have been listened to at all ; and it is certain, 
I think, that he would have provoked the monarch to 
anger, rather than led him to repentance. But by the 
telling of the touching story of the ewe lamb, he awoke 
the better nature of the king: and when, after his lord 
had given his judgment in an outburst of honest indig- 
nation, he turned and said, " Thou art the man" the 
effect was tremendous; for in the ejaculation, " 1 have 
sinned" there was the germ of the entire Fifty-first 
Psalm, and the beginning of a penitence which was as 
sincere as the transgression had been aggravated. 

Now, we can see a similar purpose in some of our 
Lord's parables ; although unhappily, owing to the hard- 
ened state of the hearts of his opponents, they were not 
brought to a similar acknowledgment of their guilt. 
Thus in the story of the wicked husbandmen (Matt, 
xxii. 33-46), the chief priests and Pharisees at the end, 
but not till then, perceived that he had spoken of them ; 
and it is recorded, that they sought to lay hands on 

i 2 Sam. xii. 1-7. 



INTRODUCTORY. 11 

him, but were prevented only by fear of the multitude. 
Still he had secured his object ; for he had so held up 
the mirror before them, that they recognized them- 
selves, and were self-condemned. Thus the parable 
was a veil which both revealed and concealed the truth. 
It was, if you will allow me to coin a word, an inverba- 
tion of the truth, corresponding in some sort to the 
incarnation of Deity in Christ himself. To those who 
had the spirit to discern, the outward covering brought 
the truth nearer, even as the incarnation has been, 
to the spiritually minded, the clearest revelation of God 
the world has ever seen ; but to those who lacked that 
spirit, there was nothing but the story, even as, to the 
materialists among us, there is nothing but mere 
humanity in the person of the Christ. With all his 
usual acuteness, but with a sublimity that is somewhat 
unwonted in his comments, Matthew Henry has said 
that parable was " the cloud " wherein the Great 
Teacher " descended." l Yea, a cloud luminous to 
some, yet dark to others ; the enveilment, but also 
the unveiling, of the truth to men. 

Now, if this view of the matter be correct, we shall 
see how two other objects were served by this use of 
parables by our Lord. For I remark, in the third place, 
that he employed them to stimulate inquiry. The man 
who saw in the story nothing but a story, wo aid turn 
away from it as trifling and unimportant ; but those who 
had the insight to perceive that the narrative was re- 
hearsed for a high moral and spiritual purpose, would 
be stirred up to inquire into that, and would be re- 
warded by the discovery of its hidden meaning. Thus 
we learn, that after the Lord had related the story of the 
sower, and that of the tares and the wheat, his disciples 

i Commentary on Matt. xiii. 1-23. 



12 THE P An ABLE S OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

came to him, and asked an explanation of his words. 
To that he responded by giving the interpretation of 
the parables : and so he exemplified the meaning, as well 
as the truth, of his own words, -Whosoever hath, to 
him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance ; 
but whosoever hath not, from him shall be taken away 
even that he hath." l 

And that leads directly and immediately to the last 
purpose which the Lord had in view in his employment 
of this method of discourse : which was. to test the char- 
acters of his hearers. Xothing better on this subject has 
ever been written than the following suggestive sentences 
by Neander, in that i; Life of Jesus Christ." which was 
the first of the answers to the notorious work of Strauss, 
and which, in my judgment, is still — with some draw- 
backs incidental to the author's theory of inspiration — 
incomparably the best of all the works under that title 
which have been published in modern times. He says. 
" The form of his expressions, whether he uttered para- 
bles, proverbs, maxims, or apparent paradoxes, was in- 
tended to spur men's minds to profounder thought, to 
awaken the divine consciousness within, and so to teach 
them to understand that which at first served only as a 
mental stimulus. It was designed to impress indelibly 
upon the memory of his hearers, truths perhaps as yet 
not fully intelligible, but which would grow clear as 
the divine life was formed within them, and become an 
ever-in creasing source of spiritual light. His doctrine 
was not to be propagated as a lifeless stock of tradition, 
but to be received, as a living Spirit, by willing minds, 
and brought out into full consciousness, according 
import, by free spiritual activity. Its individual parts, 
too, were only to be apprehended iu their first propor- 

Matt. xiii. 12. 



INTRODUCTORY. 13 

tions, in the complete connection of that higher con- 
sciousness which he was to call forth in man. The form 
of teaching which repelled the stupid, and passed un- 
heeded and misunderstood by the unholy, roused sus- 
ceptible minds to deeper thought, and rewarded their 
inquiries by the discovery of ever-increasing treasures. 
But the attainment of this end depended on the suscep- 
tibility of the hearers. So far as they hungered for true 
spiritual food, so far the parable stimulated them to 
deeper thought, and so far only it revealed new riches. 
Men with whom this really was the case were accus- 
tomed to wait until the throng had left their Master, or, 
gathering round him in a narrow circle in some retired 
spot, to seek clearer light on points which the parable 
had left obscure. The scene described in Mark iv. 10 
shows us that others besides the twelve apostles were named 
among those who remained behind to ask him questions 
after the crowd had dispersed. Not only did such ques- 
tions afford the Saviour an opportunity of imparting more 
thorough instruction, but those who felt constrained to 
offer them were thereby drawn into closer fellowship 
with him. He became better acquainted with the souls 
that were longing for salvation. The greater number, 
however, in their stupidity, did not trouble themselves 
to penetrate the shell in order to reach the kernel. 
Yet they must have perceived that they had understood 
nothing; they could not learn separate phrases from 
Christ, as they might from other religious teachers, and 
think they comprehended them, when they did not. 
And so, in proportion to the susceptibility of his hearers, 
the parables of Christ revealed sacred things to some, 
and veiled them from others, who were destined, through 
their own fault, to remain in darkness. Thus, like those 
4 hard sayings,' which were to some an insupportable 



14 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

'offence,' the parables served to sift and purge the 
throng of Christ's hearers." 1 They tested character, 
while they symbolized truth. 

III. But now a word or two as to how parables are to 
be interpreted. The Lord himself has given us a pattern 
here, and in his expositions of the parables of the sower 
and the tares he has shown us how we ought to pro- 
ceed. Each is told for the enforcement of one main 
truth ; and to that attention is to be particularly devoted, 
without seeking to run into minute details, or giving a 
significance to every little thing that is introduced. 
Now, what the main purpose of the parable is, we may 
in general discover easily, either from the manner in 
which it is introduced, or from the circumstances in 
connection with which it was delivered. Not seldom, 
indeed, the purpose is indicated in the very first words, 
as in the numerous parables beginning with " The king- 
dom of heaven is like ; " while occasionally we have it 
definitely announced, as in the words prefixed to that of 
the Pharisee and the publican : " He spake this parable 
unto certain which trusted in themselves that they were 
righteous, and despised others." 2 Sometimes, too, as in 
the case of that of the Good Samaritan, the parable is 
given as an answer to the question either of a caviller or 
of an inquirer ; and then there can be little hesitation as 
to its meaning. When we have found out, then, what the 
main drift and purpose is, we have the key for the open- 
ing-up of its significance. Still, just as, in the interpre- 
tation of the symbolism of the Jewish tabernacle, we run 
into trifling and conceit when we attempt to give a spirit- 
ual significance to every pillar, and curtain, and coupling, 

1 Neander's Life of Christ, Bonn's edition, pp. 106, 107. 

2 Luke xviii. 9. 



INTRODUCTORY. 15 

and pin ; so we miss the full force of a parable when we 
try to find a meaning in every fold of its drapery. In 
such a case, we divide the river of its teaching into so 
many little branches that it finally disappears, like one 
of those streams which flow through many channels 
into the Australian desert, and lose themselves in the 
sand. Thus, in regard to the parable of the Good 
Samaritan, which Christ himself interpreted by saying, 
" Go and do thou likewise," we have had such laborious 
trifling as this : The man who fell among thieves was 
Adam ; the thieves were the Devil and his angels ; the 
priest and Levite were the Mosaic dispensation ; the 
Good Samaritan was Christ himself ; the oil and the wine 
were the comforts and blessings of the gospel ; the beast 
on which he rode was the humanity of Christ; the set- 
ting of the wounded man thereon was his vicarious 
salvation ; the inn was the Church ; and the two pence, 
the life that now is, and the life that is to come. But 
where, meanwhile, is the great lesson of practical benefi- 
cence which the Lord designed to teach ? or how, from 
such a multitude of conceits, will one deduce an answer 
to the question, " Who is my neighbor ? " 

This may serve as a beacon of warning, and keep us 
from striking against the rock of over-minuteness. But, 
while we guard against that danger, let us not forget the 
thought whichdias been already before us ; namely, that 
the impression produced on us, and the instruction con- 
veyed to us, by the parables, depend on our own spiritual 
character and susceptibility. We must bring something 
to them before we can get any thing out of them. We 
must have the docile spirit of disciples, a willingness to 
hear, an eagerness to learn, and a readiness to accept 
what comes to us from the Great Teacher's lips ; and for 
those qualities we must apply to Him from whom all 



16 TUE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

good counsels flow. Let us first, and before all things 
else, then, seek after these ; and, having these, our study 
will be at once instructive, stimulating, and helpful to 
us in the prosecution of the Christian life. 

Different classifications of the Saviour's parables have 
been suggested by different authors ; and there are, un- 
doubtedly, some advantages to be derived from the fol- 
lowing of such a course as that which has been taken by 
Bruce and Goebel. But, on the other hand, the adoption 
of such a method is apt to make us lose sight of the very 
marked difference in structure and in theme between the 
parables recorded by Matthew, and those preserved by 
Luke ; and we may best discover the " personal equa- 
tion " of the Evangelists by taking them in the order in 
which we find them in the Gospels, while, at the same 
time, we shall secure variety of topic, and so conserve 
our interest in the series from first to last. Without 
attempting any systematic classification of the para- 
bles, therefore, we shall examine them in the order in 
which we come upon them in the narratives of the 
Evangelists. 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL, 17 



II. 

THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 

(Matt. xiii. 1-9, 18-23.) 

This thirteenth chapter of Matthew's Gospel contains 
seven parables, all of which, apparently, were spoken on 
the same occasion, and each of which was designed to 
give distinctness to one special aspect of the same sub- 
ject. That subject is "the kingdom of heaven," by 
which is meant, not the glorified state of the future life, 
but that presently existing spiritual community of which 
Christ is the head, and which is composed of those whose 
hearts and lives are subject to him as their sovereign. 
The theme is thus the same as that which is dealt with 
in the Sermon on the Mount, and the discourse in which 
these parables are found may almost be regarded as an 
illustrative appendix to that matchless address. In the 
Sermon, the Saviour treats the subject abstractly and 
impersonally : in the parables, he uses familiar figures for 
its illustration, and has special reference to the different 
effects produced by its presentation, on men of different 
dispositions. In the Sermon, he is mainly retrospective, 
and sets forth the points of contrast between the Mosaic 
system, and that which he came to introduce i in the 
parables, he is almost entirely prospective, and unfolds 
the manner of the progress of his kingdom, and the na- 
ture of its consummation. In the Sermon, he la} T sdown 
principles, and proclaims laws : in the parables, he gives 



18 TIIE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

prominence to individual cases and peculiar features. 
But both have an important bearing on the one great 
topic ; and, to have a right understanding of that as a 
whole, both must be studied together. 

Tins being the case, it is not wonderful that certain 
expositors have imagined that they saw a parallelism 
between the beatitudes of the Sermon and the parables 
of this chapter; but their attempts to establish this 
position in detail are as fanciful as those which others 
have made to prove that there is a similar relation be- 
tween these seven parables, and the epistles to the seven 
churches of Asia, in the beginning of the Book of Reve- 
lation. There is a certain fascination, for some minds, in 
the tracing of these minute resemblances between differ- 
ent portions of the Scriptures ; but all such attempts are 
more or less artificial, and in following them out we may 
miss the great lessons which the parables were meant 
to enforce. Accordingly I shall not allow myself to be 
diverted from my main purpose by the consideration 
of any such similarities, but content myself with the 
general statement that these parables were meant to set 
before us the origin, hinderances, progress, preciousness, 
and consummation of the kingdom of God among men, 
and that they really accomplish that object in such a 
way as to be clearly intelligible and strikingly impres- 
sive to every attentive reader. 

But, while we rule out fancies, it is our duty with all 
reverence to take note of facts. Now, the careful stu- 
dent will be struck with two things about these para- 
bles. He will not fail to observe, in the first place, that 
while those of the sower, — so called, — the tares, the 
mustard-seed, and the leaven, were spoken to the people 
promiscuously, those of the hidden treasure, the pearl 
of great price, and the drag-net, were given to the dis- 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 19 

ciples alone. And it is, perhaps, a fair inference from 
that fact, to say, that, while the former four deal with 
those aspects of the kingdom which are public and 
patent to all, the latter three are concerned with the 
deeper things which are matter of personal history, and 
which are fully appreciated only by those who become 
subjects of the kingdom. The first four may be verified 
by observation, but the last three have to be interpreted 
by experience. 

Again, it will be apparent to the attentive reader, that 
there is a certain beauty of arrangement in the order 
of these parables. After that of the four sorts of soil, 
which stands alone as illustrating the general effects 
produced by the preaching of the gospel anywhere, the 
other six come in pairs; and in these three couplets 
each member is the complement and companion of the 
other. Thus the parables of the tares and of the drag- 
net illustrate the same thing ; but the one gives promi- 
nence to the origin of the mixture of evil with the good 
in the kingdom, while the other directs attention to the 
means by which that state of things is to be brought to 
an end. Again, those of the hidden treasure, and the 
pearl of great price, do both illustrate the acceptance 
of the gospel by the individual believer ; but the one 
sets before us the case of a man finding what he was 
not, at the moment, looking for, while the other depicts 
the success of the earnest seeker. Once more, those of 
the mustard-seed and the leaven both illustrate the 
progress of the gospel in the world ; but, while the one 
represents its outward and visible manifestation, the 
other suggests its hidden and mysterious operation. 

These general statements are all that is required to 
point out the drift of the parables in this chapter, and 
the relation of any one of them to all the rest, so that 



20 THE PAEABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

we may now proceed to the more particular considera- 
tion of that of the four kinds of ground. 

We need not spend much time on the mere externals 
of the story. It was springtime by the Lake of Galilee, 
and a crowd of eager listeners were pressing round the 
Great Teacher as he sat upon the shore. To escape 
the crush, he stepped into a boat, which he caused to be 
pushed out a few yards ; and from that novel pulpit he 
spoke to the multitudes that lined the beach. They 
were numerous, and apparently very enthusiastic just 
then ; but they were very far from being permanently 
attached to his cause. A winnowing time was coming, 
and in a few days the great majority of them would "go 
back, and walk no more with him." The thought was 
fraught with solemnity to himself, and therefore it gave 
shape and purpose to his discourse. Why was that crowd 
so soon to melt away? Would it not be well to look at 
that question now, before their defection occurred, so 
that, if possible, some among them might be shaken up 
to such seriousness as should prevent their withdrawal ; 
while his permanent followers might, at the same time, 
be prepared for what might otherwise be most discour- 
aging? These were, as I believe, the motives which 
led the Saviour to tell this simple but suggestive story. 

There is nothing in its literal aspect that is at all 
difficult to apprehend. The sower going forth to sow 
is a familiar figure in all agricultural districts ; and in 
most places, there is the same difference in the soils on 
which the seed falls as we find here described. The 
" wayside," however, is not the margin of the highway 
with which we are so well acquainted, but rather the 
footpath through the field, like that on which the Lord 
and his disciples walked when the latter plucked the 



TTTE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 21 

ears of corn. The seed that fell by the wayside, there- 
fore, is not that which incidentally dropped from the 
sower as he was going to the field, but rather that 
which inevitably fell on the hard path through the field 
when he was passing over it at his proper work. He 
could not so nicely adjust his " cast," as that nothing 
should fall on the walk which many feet had hardened, 
and his plough had left unturned. The "stony ground" 
was not soil mixed with stones, but rather a thin layer 
of earth on the top of underlying rock. The thorny 
ground was not soil in which thorns were already 
grown rank and strong, but rather ground which had 
not been thoroughly " cleaned," as the farmer phrases 
it, and in which the seeds of thorns were present in 
abundance. The good soil was that which was neither 
trodden into hardness, nor lying in shallowness on the 
top of rocks, nor full of the roots of weeds that had not 
been carefully removed; but ground which had been 
well prepared for the reception of the seed. And the 
results corresponded in each case to the character of 
the soil. That which fell on the footpath never grew 
at all. Indeed, it never got into the soil at all, but 
became the food of birds. That which fell on the rocky 
soil grew rapidly for a season, and then withered away ; 
that which fell on the ground in which the roots of 
thorns existed grew, but with difficulty, for the thorns 
choked it, and prevented it from coming to maturity ; 
while even in the good soil there were degrees of fertil- 
ity, and in some places the crop was larger than in 
others. Here, then, is the main thought of the para- 
ble in its literal sense : the groivth of the seed depends 
always on the quality of the soil. The stress of the 
story lies not on the character of the sower, or even on 
the quality of the seed, — though that must not be lost 



22 TIIE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

sight of, — but on the nature of the soil. The crop 
depends upon the character of the ground. That is a 
universal natural law. What is here described may 
never have happened literally, in all its incidents, in 
a single case ; but always and everywhere the law of 
which these incidents are illustrations holds good. The 
growth of the seed depends on the nature of the soil. 
I emphasize that as the one great thought of the para- 
ble, because, naming it as we do, the parable of the 
sower, though we are following therein the example of 
the narrative itself, we are apt to imagine that we must 
look for its significance in something about the sower, 
rather than in the differences in the ground. The Ger- 
mans call it the parable of "the four sorts of soil; " and 
perhaps we should do well to follow their example, for 
by so denominating it we should bring into prominence 
the particular department in which its lesson lies. 

What, then, is that lesson? The Saviour has given 
us the answer in his own interpretation of the story. 
The seed is the word of God, or the word of the king- 
dom ; and the soil is human hearts : so that, reduced 
to a general law, the teaching of the parable is, that the 
results of the hearing of the gospel always and every- 
where depend on the condition of heart of those to 
whom it is addressed. The character of the hearer de- 
termines the effect of the word upon him. That which 
a man takes from the word depends on what he first 
brings to the word. This is the one lesson of the 
parable, and it is illustrated by four sorts of examples. 
Elsewhere in the Scriptures, attention is drawn very 
strongly to the character of the preacher, and to the 
nature of the instruction which he communicates ; but 
here the emphasis is laid on the character of the hearer, 
and the whole teaching of the parable is concentrated 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 23 

into the command of the Lord with which, by Luke, 
the parable is combined, " Take heed, therefore, how ye 
hear." 1 

Now, as it seems to me, this is a lesson which the men 
of our generation need very much to learn. For while, 
in the broadest and highest sense, the sower here is the 
greatest of all preachers, even the Lord Jesus himself, 
and the field is the world, yet the same great law which 
is here exemplified holds of every preacher of the gos- 
pel, and of every company of hearers to whom the 
gospel message is proclaimed. It is just as true here 
and now as it was when the Saviour sat, that day, in 
the boat on the Lake of Galilee, that the effects of the 
preaching of the gospel depend on the characters of 
the hearers. But that is an aspect of the matter which 
is too largely lost sight of in this generation. For, 
if the services of the sanctuary are uninteresting or un- 
edifying, the blame is too generally and too exclusively 
laid upon the preacher, and little or nothing is either 
said or thought about the dispositions of the hearers. I 
do not wish to say, of course, that no responsibility rests 
upon the preacher. On the contrary, it is his duty to 
adapt the presentation of the truth to the circumstances 
and necessities of those who wait upon his ministrations, 
and to take all proper means for commending it to the 
acceptance of his fellow-men ; but it ought not to be 
forgotten, that a corresponding obligation rests on them, 
and that it is their duty to cultivate spiritual susceptibil- 
ity, so that they may be interested and profited by what 
they hear. Criticism of the pulpit is very common, and 
not always very wise ; but criticism of the pews is rarely, 
if ever, heard : and while many lectureships have been 
founded in our theological seminaries of late years, for 

1 Luke viii. 18. 



24 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the treatment of the best methods of preaching, it might 
li^t be amiss to have some similar means of bringing 
before the people generally some important home truths 
on the best way of cultivating the habit of profitable 
hearing. It is well that our students should be in- 
structed how to preach, but it is equally important that 
the people should be taught how to hear ; for if it be 
true, as is sometimes cynically said, that good preaching 
is one of the lost arts, it is to be feared that good hear- 
ing also has too largely disappeared; and, wherever the 
fault may have begun, the two act and re-act on each 
other. A good hearer makes a lively preacher, just as 
really as a poor preacher makes a dull hearer; and 
eloquence is not all in the speaker. To use Mr. Glad- 
stone's illustration, he gets from his hearers in vapor 
that which he returns to them in flood, and a receptive 
and responsive audience adds fervor and intensity to his 
utterance. Eloquent hearing, therefore, is absolutely 
indispensable to effective preaching ; and so it is quite 
as necessary that listeners should be taught to hear, as 
it is that preachers should be taught what and how to 
speak. 

Now, it is just here that the lessons of this parable 
are in place ; and, when we come to examine, we shall 
find that they range themselves under two heads, — the 
negative and the positive ; or, to put it in another way, 
the things to be guarded against, and the things to be 
cultivated, in connection with the hearing of the gospel. 

I. 1. Taking, then, first, the tilings to be guarded 
against, we find foremost among these the danger of pre- 
venting the truth from getting any entrance into the soul 
at all. The seed that fell upon the pathway lay on the 
outside of the soil. The ground had been so hardened by 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 25 

the tread of many feet, that the grain could not get into it, 
and it remained un germinating and exposed until the 
birds devoured it. So, sometimes, the soul of the hearer 
has been indurated and made impenetrable to the truth 
by the traffic over it of many different things. What 
these are, it might be difficult to enumerate ; but a sam- 
ple or two will make good our statement. One of them, 
strangely enough, may be the constant hearing of the 
truth itself, as a mere religious form. The soul may be 
sermon-hardened, as well as sin-hardened. One may get 
so into the habit of having the verities of the gospel pre- 
sented to him, and resisted by him, that by and by he 
takes no note whatever of what is said by the preacher, 
and it falls on the outside of him, like rain upon a rock, 
or snow upon a roof. There is little danger of this, per- 
haps, in an age or in a place in which gospel privileges 
are rare, but it becomes very real and insidious in days 
like our own, when these blessings are so commonly and 
so regularly enjoyed ; and there are too many in all 
our congregations like Tennyson's " Northern Farmer " 
of the old school, who said about the parson, — 

" And I always came to his church, before my Sally were dead, 
And heard him a-bumming away like a buzzard-clock over my 

head ; 
And 1 never knew what he meant, but I thought he had some- 
thing to say, 
And I thought he said what he ought to have said, and I came 
away." 

This is a very serious peril, and has to be strenuously 
looked after, especially by those who have from their 
early years been constant attendants on the sanctuary. 
The preacher may do much to counteract it, indeed, by 
cultivating fresh methods of presenting and enforcing 



26 THE PARABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

the truth, and by abjuring all stereotyped phraseology 
in his discourses ; but the hearer, also, must use means 
to neutralize it, and should seek to stir up his attention 
when he enters the place of worship, by pausing a little 
to ask himself why he is there, and to lift up his heart 
in prayer to God, for the open ear to hear, and the open 
heart to receive, the message which his Lord has, in his 
providence, prepared for him. 

But another thing which makes a foot-walk over the 
soul is an evil habit. Ah ! how many men's hearts have 
become thoroughfares for sins, which have trafficked to 
and fro over them, until they have become as hard as 
the pavements of our streets, and the truth has no more 
chance of finding an entrance into them than corn 
would have to grow upon an asphaltic roadway ! Think 
of Judas in this regard, and you have a concrete in- 
stance of the sort which I would describe. How ten- 
derly, and yet how faithfully, the Lord spoke to him on 
the night of the betrayal ! One would have thought 
that he must have been moved. But no : the sin of 
covetousness, the habit of dishonesty, had so overcrusted 
his heart, that the Master's words found no entrance ; 
and " he went out," cold and callous, to do his perfidious 
deed. So, many in our modern churches have let de- 
falcation, or secret sin, or habitual self-indulgence, freeze 
over their spirits with such a hard covering of icy 
callousness, that the truth which otherwise would have 
descended to the very depths of their being, lies all 
frosted and uncared-for on the surface. Then the natu- 
ral result follows ; for the casual talk of others like 
themselves as they retire from the house of God, on 
topics of frivolous or even worse description, takes all 
remembrance of it away, and they get no good from the 
service. O my friends, take good heed here ! The 



TUB FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 27 

habits of the week will either open or stop the ears on 
the Lord's Day ; and if you would be good hearers of 
the word, you must also be faithful doers of the same. 

2. But a second danger to be avoided is that of shal- 
low impulsiveness. The seed which fell on the soil 
which lay in a thin layer on the top of the rock sprang 
up at once ; but it had no permanent result, for when 
the sun was up it withered because it had no depth of 
earth. So the man of shallow nature makes a great 
show at first. He is all enthusiasm. He " never heard 
such a sermon in all his life." He seems greatly moved, 
and for a time it looks as if he were really converted ; 
but it does not last. It is but an ague-fever, which is 
succeeded by a freezing chill; and by and by some new 
excitement follows, to give place in its turn to another 
alternation into cold neglect. He lacks depth of char- 
acter, for he has nothing but rock beneath the surface. 
He seems to have much feeling, indeed, and his religion 
is all emotional ; but, in reality, he has no proper feel- 
ing. It is all superficial. That which is only feeling, 
will not even be feeling long. For, as Robertson has 
profoundly remarked, " the superficial character is con- 
nected with the hard heart." Violent emotion is a sign 
of shallowness, and never lasts. But the tender heart 
disposes to moral thoughtfulness ; and, where that is, 
the feeling is permanent. So the heart must be kept 
from rockiness if the word heard is to go deep down 
into it, and remain rooted there : otherwise the first dif- 
ficulty will drive all sentiment away, — even as Pliable 
was daunted, and turned back, at the sight of the 
Slough of Despond. 

But you ask how all this is to be helped, if the defect 
be in character? and though that is not treated of in 
the j)arable at all, for it confines itself rigidly to one 



28 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

theme, we yet may indicate the direction in which the 
remedy is to be sought. The Lord himself, indeed, has 
elsewhere done it to our hand, when he says, 1 " Whoso- 
ever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot 
be my disciple. For which of you, intending to build a 
tower, sitteth not down first and counteth the cost, 
whether he have sufficient to finish it? Lest haply, 
after he hath laid the foundation, and is not able to 
finish it, all that behold it begin to mock him, saying, 
This man began to build, and was not able to finish. 
Or what king, going to make war against another king, 
sitteth not down first, and consulteth whether he be 
able with ten thousand to meet him that cometh against 
him with twenty thousand ? or else, while he is yet a 
great way off, he sendeth an ambassage, and desireth 
conditions of peace. So likewise, whosoever he be of 
you that forsaketh not all that he hath, cannot be my 
disciple." And we have an instance of this class in him 
who said, " Lord, I will follow thee whithersoever thou 
goest ; " to whom the Master made reply. " Foxes have 
holes, and birds of the air have nests; but the Son of 
man hath not where to lay his head ; " as also to some 
degree in Peter, who alleged that though all men should 
deny Christ, yet he never would, and who was found 
at length doing the very thing which he so strongly 
reprobated. Now, the fault in all this lies in a lack 
of thoughtfulness, or a neglecting to " count the cost." 
The man of depth looks before he leaps. He will not 
commit himself until he has carefully examined all that 
is involved ; but when he does thus commit himself, he 
does so irrevocably. He who signs a document without 
reading it will be very likely to repudiate it when any 
trouble comes of it ; but the man who knew what he 

i Luke xiv. 27-33. 



TUB FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 29 

was doing when lie appended his name to it, if he be a 
true man, will stand to his bond at all hazards. Now, 
the merely impulsive, shallow, flippant hearer acts 
without deliberation, signs his bond without reading it, 
and is therefore easily discouraged. When he is called 
to suffer any thing unpleasant for his confession, he 
backs down. He had not calculated on such a contin- 
gency. He enlisted only for the review, and not for the 
battle ; and so, on the first alarm of war, he disappears 
from the ranks. He did not stop to consider all that 
his enlistment involved ; he was allured only by the 
uniform, and the gay accessories of military life : but, 
when it came to fighting, he deserted. Ah ! but the 
Christian has to bear his cross ; and he who understands 
what that means, when he takes his place among Christ's 
disciples, is a disciple until death. With that before 
him, he will be too thoughtful to be impulsive ; for the 
very depth of his nature will keep him from demonstra- 
tiveness. How apt we are, in the light of these facts, 
to misjudge others ! The enthusiastic convert is often 
preferred to the calm and apparently unimpassioned 
disciple. The growth in the one seems so much more 
rapid than in the other, that he is put far above him. 
But when affliction or persecution arises, what a revela- 
tion it makes ! for then the enthusiasm of the one goes 
out, and that of the other comes out. That which 
causes apostasy in the one develops constancy in the 
other, and permanence is the proof of genuineness. See 
to it, then, oh! see to it, that you count the cost when 
you commit yourself to Christ. Be not content with 
mere sincerity, but cultivate depth along with it. Let 
intelligent conviction be the root of impulse ; for unless 
it be so rooted, it will wither away. 

3. But we must look now briefly at the third thing 



30 THE PARABLES OF OUR 8AVIOUR. 

to be guarded against, which we may call the preoccu- 
pation of the heart by other objects than the word heard 
by the man. This is symbolized in the parable by the 
unclean soil, wherein secretly lurked the seeds of many 
thorny weeds, which grew up with the grain, and at 
length overtopped and overmastered it, taking to them- 
selves all the sap that was needed for its nourishment, 
so that it never came to maturity. Here, you see. there 
was a real growth so far ; but it was not the exclusive 
growth of the good seed, for other things sprang up by 
which it was ultimately choked. Xow, in his interpre- 
tation of the story, the Lord tells us what these thorns 
represent in the heart of the gospel hearer. In Mat- 
thew he describes them as i; the cares of this world, and 
the deceitfulness of riches ; " in Mark he calls them " the 
cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, and the 
lusts of other things ; " while in Luke he summarizes 
them as 4i cares, and riches, and pleasures of this life." 
Xow. putting them all together, we get these four things 
symbolized by the thorns, — namely, cares, riches, ambi- 
tion, and pleasure ; and we may surely say that he who 
sees no dangers in these as competitors in the human 
heart with the word of God does not know his own 
heart, and has learned little from the observation of his 
fellow-men. 

Take the cares: and how often have we seen the 
maiden who in her young life gave great promise of a 
lofty Christian character, grow stunted and narrowed 
spiritually, under the influence of mere domestic trivi- 
alities ! 4 * Careful and troubled about many things," 
she has dwindled into a mere housekeeper, on whose 
heart the management of home sits so heavily as to over- 
lay all higher things. She can talk of nothing but her 
children; she has no vision bevond her dwelling; the 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 31 

great things of the kingdom are shut out from her per- 
ception by the nearness with which she holds the little 
tilings of her daily life to her eyes ; and the dust upon 
her furniture lies more heavily on her conscience than 
any sense of sin. She has ceased to be a companion to 
her husband in the highest sense, because she takes no 
interest in what he regards as of pre-eminent impor- 
tance ; and matters public, intellectual, and spiritual are 
all choked in her by the undue development of family 
cares. Her character shrivels, just because she has 
allowed these meaner things to get her entire devotion. 
This may seem to some a caricature, but I am con- 
vinced that there is enough of truth in it to point the 
moral of this part of the parable. And the danger can 
be obviated only through cleansing the heart of all such 
cares, by casting them on God and leaving them with 
him ; while, at the same time, the mind is turned to the 
consideration of the infinitely more momentous matters 
that Christ in his word has brought before its attention. 
Take riches, again, and how frequently we have seen a 
case like this ! A young man runs fairly well the Chris- 
tian life, and is even helped thereby into his first busi- 
ness success ; but, as his prosperity extends, his moral 
thoughtfulness contracts. He gives ever less and less 
time to private devotion. Meditation on sacred themes 
gradually disappears from his life. One after another 
his practical engagements in the field of Christian use- 
fulness are given up. His business spreads, and 
spreads, and spreads. He lets it grow upon him so that 
it is impossible for him to manage it all without over- 
taxing his strength. Then after a while there is a 
hopeless break-down in health, but not before there 
has been a far more serious deterioration in his spiritual 
life ; and he who gave such promise of bringing forth 



32 THE rABABLES OF OUR SAVIOUB. 

much fruit ends his days without bringing any to per- 
fection. Do I exaggerate in all this ? Have I overdrawn 
the picture ? And, if I have not, what a loud call is 
there in this description, to our business men, to study 
moderation, and to be on their guard against that 
deceitfulness in prosperity which would lure them on 
with the promise of greater things, into the ultimate 
loss of the greatest of all things ! How many, who 
in their earliest days were earnest Christian young 
men, have dwindled down, through their successes, into 
careless and indifferent, half-day, half-hearted hearers, 
who contend that religion never should interfere with 
business, though they themselves have let their busi- 
ness very seriously interfere with their religion ! 
" What, then," you ask, " must we go out of business ? " 
I answer, No ; but do not give your whole heart to it. 
Rule it, but never let it rule you. Transact it for God, 
and so consecrate it to God. Let God send you to 
your business, but beware of letting your business send 
you away from God. 

Take, again, ambition, the desires of other things, and 
you may see the same thing illustrated. It makes no 
matter whether the department be literature, or science, 
or politics : the determination at all hazards and at 
every sacrifice to be eminent in any of them is fraught 
with danger to the Christian life, and may choke the 
growth of the word in the heart. It is the sucker 
which draws away the sap from the tree, and so robs 
it of its vitality, that it immediately begins to decay. 
What happens, commonly, when a man among us goes 
into politics, and becomes absorbingly desirous of get- 
ting the position of a senator or a governor, or what 
not? If the office seeks him, he may be all safe, and 
may keep himself in the line of spiritual growth; but if 



TIIE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 33 

he seeks the office with overmastering ambition, let him 
beware, for, if he persist in such a course, he may choke 
out his Christian life. Christ must be supreme, or he 
retires altogether from the soul. 

Finally take pleasure, and then tell me what a poor, 
paltry, butterfly Christianity (if, indeed, we should call 
it Christianity at all) theirs is who try to combine with 
their profession a life in and for fashion and frivolity. 
We cannot withdraw from society, indeed ; but they who 
delight in it as the supreme good have already overlaid 
the germs of spiritual life within them, and will soon 
become worldlings. 

Am I wrong, my friends, when I say that in these 
thorns we have the great dangers against which gos- 
pel hearers in this day and in this place . need most 
of ail to guard? They are too largely choking the 
growth of the word in the city as a whole. They 
have encroached on our week-day Christianity, and 
they are gradually invading the sanctuary of the Lord's 
Day itself; while among individuals they are growing 
so strong and rank, that the closet is too much neg- 
lected ; family worship has almost disappeared ; the 
weekly prayer and conference meeting is ignored ; and 
every thing is made to give way to business or pleas- 
ure or ambition. I am no pessimist ; but I see in all this 
a great peril, not only to individuals, but to the Church 
as a whole, and to the community at large. 

II. I ought now to go on to the consideration of the 
qualities to be cultivated by gospel hearers, as these are 
indicated in the Saviour's explanation of the seed which 
fell into good soil ; but the length to which my remarks 
have already extended, as well as the fact that I have 
already incidentally anticipated much that might be 



34 TIIE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

said on this branch of the subject, must constrain me to 
be brief. Our Lord, as reported by Luke, says, " That on 
the good ground are they which in an honest and good 
heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth 
fruit with patience." "An honest and good heart," — 
that is what we need when we come to listen to the 
word ; a heart whose aim is noble, and which is entirely 
devoted to that aim ; such a heart as Cornelius had when 
he said to Peter, "Now therefore are we all here pres- 
ent, to hear all things that are commanded us of God ; " 1 
such a heart as the Bereans had, of whom it is said that 
after listening to Paul they " searched the Scriptures 
daily, whether these things were so." 2 

Now, the qualities which such hearts bring to the 
hearing of the gospel are these : Attention : they hear. 
Meditation : they keep. Obedience : they bring forth 
fruit with patience. 

1. There is, first, attention. The good hearer stirs 
himself up to listen. Lie trains himself to follow the 
speaker. He will not be allured, b}^ any association, to 
take his mind away from the truths which are brought 
before him. He will leave his business behind him for 
the time. He will let the dress and appearance of his 
fellow-hearers alone. He will recognize, that, in the 
providence of God's Spirit, there is something in the daily 
ministration for him ; and he will be eagerly on the watch 
lest he should miss that. His hearing is an opportunity, 
and he is determined to make the most of it in that 
aspect of the case. 

2. There is, second, meditation. I use that term, 
rather than "remembrance," as the equivalent of "keep- 
ing" the word: for some have such memories that they 
can recall an address verbatim, while yet it does them no 

1 Acts x. 23. 2 ibid., xvii . ii. 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 35 

apparent good ; and others have no verbal remembrance of 
what has been said, while yet somehow the subject seems 
to have permeated their spirits and greatly benefited 
them, because they have caught the drift of the thought, 
and have carried out independent meditation thereon. 
Not, therefore, the memory of what we hear, but reflec- 
tive thought upon it, is of essential service here ; and 
we must not imagine that what we cannot recall does 
us no good, any more than that, because we can recall 
it, we must surely be the better for it. Meditation is to 
hearing what digestion is to eating : it assimilates what 
we hear, for our own edification and growth in grace. 
And the good and honest heart will always seek to 
have some time for its exercise after the hearing of the 
word. But alas ! meditation as a Christian exercise is 
rapidly disappearing from among us. A great English 
preacher has said, " I, for my part, believe that there 
are few Christian duties more neglected than that of 
meditation, the very name of which has fallen of late 
into comparative disuse that augurs ill for the frequency 
of the thing. We are so busy discussing, defending, 
inquiring, or preaching, and teaching, and working, that 
we have no time and no leisure of heart for quiet con- 
templation, without which the exercise of the intellect 
upon Christ's truth will not feed, and busy activity in 
Christ's cause may starve the soul. There are few 
things which the Church of this day in all its parts 
needs more than to obey the invitation, " Come ye your- 
selves apart into a lonely place, and rest a while."' 1 
This witness is true. Let us learn, therefore, from 
these words, to cultivate this neglected grace. Willmot 
says, in his hints on reading, "Proportion an hour's re- 

1 Alex. Maclaren, D.D., The Secret of Power, and other Sermons, 
p. 35. 



36 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

flection to an hour's reading, and so dispirit the book 
into the student." 1 So I would say, Let every time of 
hearing be followed by a time of meditation ; that the 
seed which has fallen on the soil may, as it were, be 
" harrowed " into it by the process. 

3. Then there is, finally, obedience : they bring forth 
fruit with patience. To hear without obeying is to 
harden the heart; for, as Bishop Butler says, "passive 
impressions grow weaker by being repeated." 2 So the 
man who, being affected by what he hears, takes no action 
thereon, only makes himself thereby more impervious to 
the truth when it is again presented, and he will need more 
to bring these feelings back another time, than he did to 
have them produced at first; until at last he becomes 
"past feeling" altogether. But the acting on what we 
hear prepares us for being better hearers next time, and 
quickens the receptivity of the soul. Even among 
good hearers, however, there will be differences, and 
some will make more of their opportunities than others ; 
just as in the good soil some brought forth thirty-fold, 
some sixty-fold, and some an hundred-fold. But these 
discrepancies may be owing to inherent and original 
differences of disposition, and should neither make 
us envious of others, nor dispose us to think ourselves 
superior to them. 

To sum up, then, the great lesson of this parable is, 
that, to get all the good out of the hearing of the word 
that we possibly can, we must bring to it an honest 
heart, that will attend to, meditate on, and act out the 
truth which is presented to it. And we must be on our 
guard against a heart that is hardened into impervious- 
ness, or characterized by superficial impulsiveness, or 

1 Willinot's Pleasures of Literature, p. 38. 

2 Butler's Analogy, Part L, chap. v. 



THE FOUR KINDS OF SOIL. 37 

foul with the germs of care or covetousness or ambition 
or pleasure. And if you want to know where and how 
to get such a heart, go home, and ponder and pray over 
these words of the sacred historian regarding the first 
Christian convert in Philippi : " whose heart the Lord 
opened, that she attended to the things that were 
spoken of Paul." 1 

1 Acts xvi. 13. 



38 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



III. 

THE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 

(Matt. xiii. 24-30, 36-43, 47-50.) 

These two parables must be taken together. They 
form one of the " pairs " which we named in our last dis- 
course, when we classified the parables contained in this 
chapter. They illustrate different shades of the same 
general truth. Both alike deal with the co-existence 
of good and evil within the same enclosure, and both of 
them look at the question of the absolute separation 
of the evil from the good ; but the one gives prominence 
to the impracticability of attaining that before a certain 
period, while the other emphasizes the assurance that 
such a separation will be ultimately secured. 

In the parable of the tares, we have a field, which, 
after due preparation, the husbandman sows with good 
wheat. But after a while, and before that seed has 
sprouted, an enemy steals along in the night, when all 
honest people are asleep, and sows the field over again 
with tares. There is therefore, you observe, no censure 
even so much as implied, on men generally for being 
asleep. It was the time for sleep, and they were taking 
only their regular and proper rest. But the enemy, 
knowing that, took advantage of it to carry out his 
malicious purpose, and contrived to do a very mean 
and troublesome thing. For the tare — which is not 



TUE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 39 

to be confounded with the vetch that is often called by 
that name in England — was really the bearded darnel, 
which is a very noxious weed. In the earlier stages of 
its growth, it is almost impossible for any one to distin- 
guish it from wheat or barley ; although, when both it 
and the wheat have "headed out," the one is easily 
known from the other. Says Dr. Thomson, " Even the 
farmers, who in Palestine generally weed their fields, 
do not pretend to distinguish the one from the other. 
They would not only mistake good grain for tares, but 
very commonly the roots of the two are so intertwined 
that it is impossible to separate them without plucking 
out both." 1 The same author assures us that he had 
never heard of Arab malice having tried to injure an 
enemy in this particular way : but it must have been 
known in the time of our Saviour; and Dean Alford 2 
tells us that even in England, in this enlightened age, a 
field that belonged to himself was thus wilfully and 
enviously sown with charlock over the wheat, and heavy 
damages were obtained against the offender. In course 
of time, both wheat and tares grew up ; and when the 
tares revealed themselves, the servants of the husband- 
man asked whether they should pull them up ; but he, 
knowing the nature of the darnel, and unwilling to 
endanger the wheat, forbade them to do any thing, say- 
ing, " Let both grow together until the harvest." When 
the reaping-time came, however, and the thing could be 
done without detriment to the wheat, the tares were 
gathered into bundles and burned, and the wheat was 
housed in the barn. Here, then, as we have already 
hinted, we have the separation between the good and 
the evil deferred, for a good reason too, till the com- 

1 Central Palestine and Phoenicia, pp. 395, 396. 

2 Greek Testament, in loco. 



40 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

pletion of growth and the . ripening of both; and then 
it is absolutely and forever effected. 

In the parable of the net, we see fishermen, such as 
some of the apostles themselves were, casting their long 
seine-net into the lake, and then dragging it by boats at 
either end to the shore. It brings in a heterogeneous 
collection of all sorts of things that swim the deep, and 
much that is of no use whatever to anybod} r . But by 
and by order is brought out of the confusion ; for the 
fishermen gather that which is good into vessels, and 
cast the bad away. Here, again, we have good and bad 
in the same enclosure. The mixture in this case could 
not have been prevented by any ordinary fisherman, but 
there was a separation at the last. 

So far all is plain. But what is the spiritual signifi- 
cance of all this? The Lord himself has' given us a 
partial answer, in his interpretation of the parable of 
the tares, when he tells us that the field is the world ; 
that the sower of the good seed is the Son of man ; that 
the sower of the tares is the Devil ; and thut the wheat 
represents the children of the kingdom, and the tares 
the children of the wicked one. We have also much 
light shed on the whole matter, when we learn that the 
harvest is the end of the world, and that the separation 
between the good and the bad shall take place at the 
final judgment, — all of which is confirmed by the words 
with which the Lord concludes the parable of the net : 
" So shall it be at the end of the world : the angels shall 
come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, 
and shall cast them into the furnace of fire ; there shall 
be wailing, and gnashing of teeth." 

But all this, I said, is only & partial answer, and some 
may wonder at my using such an expression in regard 



THE TABES, AND THE BRAG-NET. 41 

to any interpretation given by the Lord himself. Yet 
it is the literal truth ; for there has been immense diffi- 
culty, from the earliest days of the Church until now, in 
coming at the meaning of his words, " the field is the 
world ; " and you will observe that he has himself left 
out of his interpretation of the parable all reference 
whatever to the proposal of the servants to go and 
gather up the tares, as also to the answer of the hus- 
bandman to this effect : " Nay, lest while ye gather up 
the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. Let 
both grow together until the harvest." And there has 
been much discussion as to the spiritual significance 
of that conversation. We can hardly suppose that so 
prominent a colloquy had no hidden meaning ; and yet 
the silence of the Saviour regarding it has left the mat- 
ter open, and that has provoked considerable contro- 
versy. 

The main questions are these : What does Christ 
precisely mean when he says, " the field is the world " ? 
And did he desire it to be inferred from the conversa- 
tion between the husbandman and his servants, that no 
means whatever are to be taken for keeping the good 
from being contaminated and injured by the evil ? 

First, what precisely does he mean when he says that 
" the field is the world " ? Does he mean the world in 
its most extensive sense, as including the human race 
as a whole ? Or does he mean what we in these days 
would call the Church visible, which consists of the 
aggregation of all the Christian organizations in the 
world? Since the days of the Donatist controversy, 
in the beginning of the fifth century, that has been a 
much-contested question. On the one hand, it has been 
contended that the parable refers to the history of the 
human race, and that it was simply intended to forbid 



42 TTIE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

every thing like persecution for religious opinion or 
belief. Xo attempt should be made, either by civil 
magistrate or by church dignitary or by ecclesiastical 
court, to get rid of error or unbelief by putting the 
heretic or the infidel to death. Let both believer and 
unbeliever live. Both alike are accountable for all such 
things to God alone, and he will send every one to his 
own place at the last. So said the Donatists when 
they were pressed with this parable by Augustine, who 
inferred from it that the absolutely pure church for 
which they were contending was to be found alone in 
heaven ; and so virtually say still such commentators as 
Arnot and Abbot. Such also was my own opinion when 
I went to study the parable with a view to the prepa- 
ration of this discourse. But the longer time I have 
given to the consideration of the subject, the less am I 
inclined to hold by this view as correct. For the para- 
ble is designed to illustrate the kingdom of heaven, 
" which signifies the new order of things which Christ 
came to establish, and which is conveniently described 
as the church which owns him as its Lord." 1 It will 
hardly do, therefore, to adopt an interpretation which 
sends us away back to the creation of man, when all 
in him as well as around him was very good, and which 
sees in the temptation of our first parents the sowing of 
the field with tares. The sower of the good seed is 
the Son of man : therefore it is clear that we must look 
in the church, and after the incarnation, for the growth 
of that seed ; and there, too, we must look for the tares 
which sprang up among the wheat. This view is cor- 
roborated by the parable of the net; for, if the net is 
not the church, what is it ? Mr. Arnot virtually — at 
least, so it seems to me — answers, Death ; but that 

1 Plumptre, in loc. 



THE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 43 

is surely a far-fetched view of the case, and the conscious- 
ness that it is so seems almost to betray itself in the 
vague phraseology which he has employed. Here are 
his words : " The sea is the world. The net, almost or 
altogether invisible at first to those whom it surrounds, 
is that unseen bond, which, by an invisible ministry, is 
stretched over the living, drawing them gradually, se- 
cretly, surely, toward the boundary of this life, and 
over it into another." 1 It is a long periphrasis, but I 
can make nothing else out of it than Death, with his 
stealthy march, gathering all on to the shore of the 
beyond, preparatory to final judgment. But what has 
that to do with the kingdom of heaven, — the new sys- 
tem which Christ set up, and to which the net is here 
likened ? Was not all that just as true of death and 
the race before Christ came ? And must we not seek 
for the interpretation in something peculiar to the king- 
dom of heaven as such ? These considerations outweigh 
all others. And so we regard the net here as repre- 
senting the church, and that finds its parallel in the 
field in the parable of the tares. In the church, there- 
fore, as in the net and in the field, there will be both 
good and bad. 

Well, but, if that is the case, what are we to make 
of the command given to the servants, " Let both grow 
together until the harvest "? — do not attempt just now 
to uproot the tares, lest ye pull up the wheat with 
them. Does not that look like a formal prohibition of 
any thing like discipline in the visible Church ? And 
can an interpretation which leads to such a conclusion 
be correct ? No doubt, on the first blush of the matter, 
there appears to be great force in these objections ; and 
it was on account of them, I believe, that Mr. Arnot 

1 The Parables of Our Lord, by Rev- William Arnot, p. 170. 



44 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

was so strenuous in advocating the other view. But in 
reply to them I would advance the following considera- 
tions : First, That church discipline is clearly enjoined 
by many plain passages of the New Testament, and 
that no interpretation of any parable may be put against 
that. It is a recognized canon of interpretation, that 
nothing in a parable is to be made, simply in and of 
itself, the foundation of a doctrine or a practice. So, 
whatever may be the meaning of this parable, it will 
not invalidate what is elsewhere plainly laid down as to 
discipline. Second, Discipline rightly understood is for 
the saving of a man to the church, and not for the cast- 
ing of him out of it. The end of discipline is not so 
much the purity of the church, — though that of course 
is not to be lost sight of, — as the restoration of the 
offender. Third, What the parable here recommends is 
not so much the following of a certain course, as the 
cultivating of a certain spirit. As Bruce has said in 
this very connection, " Christ is not here laying down 
a rule for the regulation of ecclesiastical practice, but 
inculcating the cultivation of a certain spirit, the spirit 
of a wise patience." And again, " The parable neither 
prohibits nor fixes limits to ecclesiastical discipline, but 
teaches a spirit that will affect that part as well as all 
other parts of religious conduct, and which, if it had 
prevailed in the church more than it ever has prevailed, 
would have made the church's history very different 
from what it is." 1 Do as we will, we shall never get 
evil entirely out of the church in this world ; and the 
attempt to uproot it at all hazards is sure to end in 
something worse than that which was sought to be re- 
moved. 

These are the two truths which to me now are sug- 

1 The Parabolic Teaching of Christ, by. A. B. Bruce, D.D., pp. 54, 55. 



THE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 45 

gested by the principal portion of the parable of the 
tares ; while the concluding part of it, and the whole 
parable of the net, give solemn emphasis to the fact, 
that what is impracticable here will be accomplished at 
last, when " the righteous shall shine forth as the sun in 
the kingdom of their Father ; and all that offend, and 
they which do iniquity, shall be cast into the place of 
torment, where shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." 
Let us seek to illustrate briefly each of these three 
points, and so get at the combined essence of these two 
parables. 

I. Do as we will, we shall never get evil entirely out 
of the church. The ideal church is in heaven. Of that, 
and that alone, can it be said with truth, " And there 
shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, 
neither whatsoever worketh abomination or maketh a 
lie ; but they which are written in the Lamb's book of 
life." 2 Even the Donatists were obliged to admit, that, 
with all their efforts to obtain purity of communion, 
they were unable absolutely to gain that on which their 
hearts were set. In the Philippian church there were 
many of whom Paul, weeping, wrote that they were 
" the enemies of the cross of Christ ; " and among the 
twelve who were the first apostles of the Lord, we can- 
not forget that there was Judas, the son of perdition. 
Always there has been this mixture of good and evil, 
even in the visible Christian Church ; and there always 
will be, till the time of the end. 

Now, this truth, sad in itself, has a twofold lesson in 
it. First, it is well fitted to give comfort to those who 
are laboring in the ministry of the gospel, and to all 
who are tenderly solicitous for the honor of the church. 

i Rev. xxi. 27. 



46 THE PABABLES OE OUB SAYIOUB. 

As a faithful pastor's ministry lengthens out, few things 
tend more to sadden him than the perception of im- 
perfections, positive blemishes, and evils in the char- 
acters and conduct of those who are members of the 
church. In the beginning of his career, he is all on fire 
for the conversion of sinners ; so much so, indeed, that 
the Christians among his hearers are apt to feel as if 
they were almost neglected in his daily ministrations. 
But after a while they who ran well are seen to be 
somehow hindered, and ever and anon, it may be, to fall 
into serious sins ; so that he is in danger of becoming 
discouraged, and learns that he must give a little more 
of his attention to the watch and guidance of those who 
have been converted and are already in the church. 
These feelings, too, are largely shared by the office- 
bearers who are associated with him ; and they all enter 
into the spirit which must have dictated the words of 
Keble : — 

" Lord, in thy field I work all day, 
I read, I preach, I warn and pray ; 
And yet these wilful, wandering sheep, 
Within thy fold I cannot keep." 1 

Now, at such a time, the thought emphasized by the 
first of these parables comes as a relief. The pastor 
learns from it, that tares are to be expected among the 
wheat, and that never on earth shall the one be entirely 
separated from the other. He discovers that no new 
thing has happened to him, but that the trial which has 
come upon him is one which has been common to all 
who have labored in the service of the Church from 
the beginning ; and while he never thinks of becoming 
the less earnest in his declaration of the whole counsel 

1 The Christian Year : Tuesday in Whitsun week. 



THE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 47 

of God, or the less desirous for the purity of the church, 
he moderates his expectations, and begins to look for 
things which otherwise would have been serious dis- 
appointments and discouragements. Now, that is a 
great matter ; and it is well for all who are pastors or 
office-bearers or members of the church, and seriously 
concerned for its purity, to remember it. Especially it 
is well that the younger brethren in the ministry should 
take note of it ; for, while it will not abate their zeal, 
it will keep them from looking for impossibilities, and 
from courting disappointment. 

But, secondly, this truth is well calculated to correct 
the error of those who decline to enter into the mem- 
bership of the church because it is not absolutely pure. 
There are multitudes everywhere who make the faults 
of some who are in the church an excuse for their 
remaining unconnected with any church. They cannot 
get a church pure enough to satisfy them. But have 
these friends ever reflected, that even if they could get, 
on the earth, a perfectly pure church, it would be at 
once defiled by their connection with it ? For they them- 
selves surely cannot claim to be absolutely perfect, and 
therefore by joining such a church they would at once 
contaminate it. But, more to our present purpose, they 
are looking for what they cannot find upon the earth. 
For admissions into the membership of the church are 
regulated by men who cannot see into the heart, so that 
it is inevitable that they should be sometimes deceived ; 
and, the more of value that there comes to be attached to 
church-membership in a community, the more frequently 
will such deception be practised upon them, just as a 
forger seeks most frequently to counterfeit the notes of 
highest figure. Let no man, therefore, plead the impurity 
of the church as an excuse for his not joining it ; for the 



48 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

pure church is in heaven, and the true conception of the 
earthly church is that of a school for the training of 
imperfect Christians toward that perfection which is to 
be found at last above. The church is not a great ex- 
hibition-hall for the display of perfect Christians, but an 
educational institution for the development of imperfect 
believers. Men do not go to school because they know 
what is to be taught in it, but that they may learn that 
of which they are ignorant : and the true spirit in which 
one should enter the church is that of a humble disciple, 
who confesses his weakness and ignorance and imper- 
fection, and is willing to take Christ as his teacher, that 
he may learn of him. 

II. But the second great lesson taught by the para- 
ble of the tares is that the rash attempt to separate the 
good from the bad in the church may result in a state 
of things that is worse than that which is sought to be 
amended. The premature effort to secure the absolute 
best may result in the positive worst. This holds in 
every department of life ; and wherever you go, or in 
whatever sphere you may be called to labor, you will 
find that you will have patiently to put up, for a time, 
with things of which you cannot, in the abstract, ap- 
prove ; lest, by trying hastily to mend them, you make 
them worse than ever. Moses even, as a lawgiver, suf- 
fered many things for the hardness of men's hearts. He 
did not approve of the practices which he found exist- 
ing among the Hebrews in regard to marriage, blood- 
revenge, and the like : but so deeply rooted were 
in the habits of the people, that any effort on his part :; 
remove them at once and altogether might have led to 
the repudiation of the law as a whole : so he was con- 
tent with something short of the best, in order to obtain 



THE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 49 

the better. We find the same principle underlying the 
proverb, which is so frequently quoted in politics, that 
" half a loaf is better than no bread ; " and there are 
many among us who think we see that the enthusiastic 
prohibitionists, who oppose every restriction short of the 
absolute best which they advocate, are losing sight of 
the wisdom which the lesson of this parable inculcates. 
But it is not otherwise in the church. We have to do 
with things as they are ; and we must patiently bear 
with some matters which we cannot approve, because 
we cannot reform them without seriously imperilling 
other and more important interests. Take the matter 
of music, for example. A young pastor coming to a 
church may feel that the existing state of " the service 
of song in the house of the Lord" is far from being 
what it ought to be. What must he do? Let me 
answer by quoting a short section from my lectures to 
the students at Yale: "Accept the situation, and make 
the very best possible out of it, for the glory of God 
and the edification of the people. Only [let him] 
remember this, that nothing will more interfere with 
his usefulness or his happiness, than the stirring-up 
of a musical quarrel. The best all round is often lost 
by attempting to have the absolute best in any one 
department. In the organ, if every note be separately 
tuned up to the scale, discord will be the effect when 
one attempts to play upon it; for it is an imperfect 
instrument, anu most of the fifths must be left some- 
what flat, and the few others made somewhat sharp, the 
octaves alone being put in perfect unison. So, if we 
attempt to bring up the music to the point of perfec- 
tion, we shall most likely put the whole church out of 
tune. We must make the best of things as a whole, 
and be conten ; sometimes with a little less in some 



50 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

departments, and a little more in others, in order that 
we may have harmony in all. Peace in a church is 
essential to progress. The dew is not shed forth in a 
storm, but in the gentle calm of the summer's eve it 
distils on eveiy blade of grass. So the Spirit comes 
not down amid controversy and debate ; but where 
brethren are dwelling in unity, there the Lord com- 
mandeth the blessing, even life forevermore. No music, 
however perfect, is for a moment to be preferred to 
those higher matters of spiritual life, for the fostering 
of which the church exists. l The life is more than 
meat, and the body than raiment.'' The church is more 
than music," 2 and the gaining of the finest music that 
was ever rendered is not worth a church quarrel. 

Now, it is quite similar with discipline. Discipline is 
for the church, not the church for discipline ; and that 
uncompromising purism which will insist on casting 
every little peccadillo out of the church, and disciplin- 
ing a man for matters of small moment, concerning 
which many of the members have no conscientious 
scruples whatever, will end in the absolute annihilation 
of the church itself. In this connection, there comes 
to my memory a fact narrated to me by a brother 
minister in England to this effect. He had been visit- 
ing a Scottish town, and called on a friend there who 
belonged to one of the little denominations which had 
broken off from a larger one on some scruple of con- 
science. " How is your church getting on ? " he asked. 
" Oh," replied his friend, with a kind of humor for 
which he was noted, " our church seems to me to have 
been born for the illustration of the infinite divisibility 
of matter, for there are now forty-five members and 
seven churches." We recall, too, the story — true or 

1 The Ministry of the Lord, pp. 234, 235. 



THE TABES, AND TIIE DRAG-NET. 51 

false, I have no means of knowing, but it may well 
enough have been true — of a small church whose mem- 
bers went on excommunicating and excommunicating 
each other for every little thing, until there was left, as 
a remnant, only a man and his wife. " Well," said one 
to her, "you must have got a pure church at last." 
"'Deed," was the answer, with inimitable self-compla- 
cency, " 'deed, and I am not so sure of John." That is 
the reductio ad absurdum of this rash and premature 
attempt to get the absolute best. The boy thought it 
was a good device, when, after being well pecked by 
the hen for seeking to find how many eggs were beneath 
her, he said, " Oh, I know how to get her out : I will 
burn her out." And he did so, but he burned the barn 
down with her. So it has frequently happened in far 
more serious matters, and a church has been destroyed 
in the effort simply made by some imprudent men to get 
what they supposed was the absolute best. A quarrel 
about communion-wine has before now closed up a 
church, and quenched a light that could not be re- 
kindled. So true it is, that, in the effort to root up 
the tares, the wheat also has been plucked with them. 

Again, however, I am anxious that you should not mis- 
understand all this. It is not a condemnation of disci- 
pline wisely administered, but it is the recommendation 
of a spirit of forbearance akin to that which the Master 
showed when he allowed Judas, after his knowledge of 
his dishonesty, to remain for years among his disciples. 
And the full reason for this forbearance no parable can 
furnish, for it lies in this : that, by the influence of that 
patience, the evil members may become good, and the 
tares — a natural impossibility, but a spiritual possibility 
— be transmuted into wheat. On the one hand, then, 
there is in this rashness a danger of destroying the 



52 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

good that is in a church : on the other, there is a pros- 
pect and hope, by the patience which I have been enfor- 
cing, of changing the evil into the good ; and so on all 
grounds it ought to be preferred. As Goebel has said, 
u The prohibition in this parable is not opposed to any 
kind of church discipline, exercised on individual mem- 
bers for their training, or as an atonement (?) for a 
special public scandal ; but it is simply directed against 
the fundamental attempt, by summary and absolute 
exclusion of all false members, to establish the Church 
of God's kingdom in complete purity and sanctity dur- 
ing the stadium of its development on the ground of 
the world." 1 

III. But now, finally, both the parables, and especially 
that of the net, emphasize the fact that there will be, at 
the last judgment, an absolute separation between the 
good and the bad. " The Son of man shall send forth 
his angels ; and they shall gather out of his kingdom 
all things that offend, and them which do iniquity, and 
shall cast them into a furnace of fire : there shall be 
wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the right- 
eous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their 
Father." And again : " At the end of the world the 
angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from 
among the just, and shall cast them into the furnace 
of fire : there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth." 
The judgment shall make that separation for all men. 
But here the solemn part of the lesson is, that those 
who are to be separated from each other were together 
in the Church of Christ upon the earth. And so the 
warning comes with terrible power, to the effect that 

1 The Parables of Jesus, by Siegfried Goebel, translated by Professor 
Banks, p. 73. 



THE TARES, AND THE DRAG-NET. 53 

mere membership in the church gives no guaranty of 
everlasting felicity. Read the concluding sections of 
the Sermon on the Mount, and you will understand 
better, perhaps, the Saviour's meaning here. It is not 
enough that you have eaten and drunk in Christ's pres- 
ence, and that you have been active in working in and 
for the church : the question is, Are you in Christ ? 
It is not enough that you are growing in the field of 
the church : the question is, Are you wheat, or tares ? are 
you Christ's in heart and soul and character, as well as 
by profession and position ? It is not enough that you 
are enclosed in the net of the church : the question, after 
all, is, Are you good or bad in it ? I shall not undertake 
to answer that for you ; but I will urge you to take it 
with you to the closet, and ask God to help you to find 
the truth about it for yourselves there. 

And if, at last, judgment is to begin thus at the house 
of God, what shall the end be of them that " obey not 
the gospel of God"? If the impure member of the 
church is to be cast out forever into the place where shall 
be wailing and gnashing of teeth, what shall be the 
portion of the open sinner ? Let him not congratulate 
himself that he is innocent of insincerity or hypocrisy ; 
for, though that be true, it is only a confession that he 
is sincerely God's enemy, and that is a terrible thing. 
Beware, therefore, lest you break yourself against the 
thick bosses of the Almighty's buckler, and be ever- 
lastingly cut off. 



54 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



IV. 

THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEADEN. 

(Matt. xiii. 31-33.) 

Ix the parables belonging to this chapter which we 
have already considered, the Lord has dealt mainly 
with the obstacles which his kingdom had to meet 
alike in the hearts of men and in the malice of Satan ; 
but in those now before us he proceeds to speak of its 
final triumph. These also constitute a pair, and must 
be studied together if at least we would get at the full 
truth regarding the subject of which they both treat. 
That subject is the progress of the kingdom of heaven 
upon the earth ; but the one gives prominence to the 
external contrast between its small beginning and its 
ultimate magnitude, while the other emphasizes the 
method of its internal operation, and the universality 
of its diffusion at the last. 

In the former the kingdom is compared to a mustard- 
seed planted by a man, which grew up to be so large that 
the birds of the air found a lodging in its branches. 
Among the rabbins, " a grain of mustard-seed " was a 
familiar phrase for any thing exceedingly small, just as 
we sometimes speak of a " peppercorn ; " and with this 
fact in our minds it is idle, as Dr. James Hamilton has 
said, 1 to seek for a seed more tiny, or to press the words, 
"which is indeed the least of all seeds," into literal 

i Fairbairn's Imperial Bible Dictionary, art. " Mustard-seed." 



THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 55 

exactness, and cavil at the accuracy of the representa- 
tion, because it may turn out that the seed of a poppy 
or the spore of a fungus is smaller. When this little 
germ is planted, it grows up to become one of the lar- 
gest of herbs. It does not develop into a size like that 
of the oak or the cedar tree ; but it overtops other herbs, 
and becomes sufficiently high and expansive for birds 
to find shelter in its branches. A great result from a 
small beginning, a large growth from a little germ, — 
that is the one thought of the parable, and of that 
the Lord declares that the kingdom of heaven upon the 
earth is an instance. It is simply absurd, therefore, to 
endeavor to find a hidden meaning in the field in which 
the seed was planted, in the man who planted it, in the 
pungency of the mustard, or in the little birds that 
seek shelter beneath its leaves. All these are over- 
refinements and irrelevant, tending only to withdraw 
attention from the main point for the bringing-out of 
which the parable was employed, and which in these 
later days needs only to be stated to be recognized. 
The kingdom of heaven on the earth had a beginning, 
which, when compared with its present condition, is as 
the mustard-seed is to the herb that grows therefrom. 

The Christian Church was almost insignificant, exter- 
nally at least, in its origin. Two of the disciples of 
John the Baptist having heard their master say, as he 
pointed to Jesus, " Behold the Lamb of God, that tak- 
eth away the sin of the world," followed him with 
the inquiry, " Rabbi, where dwellest thou ? " spent the 
night with him, became convinced that he was the 
Christ, and determined to take him as their master. 
That was all. Then one of these brought his brother ; 
and a third who had been meanwhile called brought 



56 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

one of his friends, who in turn enlisted his fellow- 
townsman ; and so it went on until after the lapse of 
two or three centuries it had overspread the Roman 
Empire, and now its adherents are numbered by 
millions, dwelling on all the quarters of the globe, 
and on the islands of all the seas. It is another 
version of Daniel's prophecy that the stone cut out of 
the mountain, without hands, should become a great 
mountain, and fill the whole earth; and another illus- 
tration of Zechariah's words, " Who hath despised the 
day of small things ? " The parable gives no indication 
how this result was to be brought about. It rather 
implies than mentions the vitality of the seed ; and it 
has nothing to say about the philosophy of its growth, 
or about the nature of the effects which it produces. 
It simply points the contrast between the smallness of 
the beginning, and the magnitude of the result. 

This is a thought with which in many other depart- 
ments we are familiar; but there is none of them all 
which can furnish such an exemplification of it as that 
which is given by the Christian Church. In its origin 
it was all but unnoticed by the great ones of the earth. 
Hardly a secular historian alludes to it, and the two 
who do make mention of it speak of the gospel as a 
wretched superstition ; but to-day it is the most con- 
spicuous fact in the civilized world, and it is still 
pushing its conquests into the uttermost parts of the 
earth. The handful of corn scattered upon the tops of 
the mountains now shakes like the cedars of Lebanon. 
The fishermen disciples of the despised Xazarene have 
multiplied into twelve million fold. "The stone which 
the builders despised has become the head stone of the 
corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous 
in our eyes." 



THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 57 

The parable of the mustard-seed is taken from the 
garden or the field ; that of the leaven is derived from 
the household. There is nothing, therefore, in the 
homely work of this woman which needs any explana- 
tion at my hands. Probably every house-mother here 
knows more about it than I could tell her; and we 
can all see that it is employed, to illustrate that active 
and aggressive principle in the kingdom of heaven 
which assimilates men to Christ, and which is to con- 
tinue at work on the earth until "the kingdoms of 
this world are become the kingdom of our Lord and 
of his Christ, and he shall reign for ever and ever." 

It has been thought by some, indeed, that as leaven 
is generally — we may even say almost invariably — 
used as a symbol of evil, we must take this parable 
as designed to set before us the progress of corruption, 
rather than of regeneration, in the world. This view 
has been specially advocated by many brethren whose 
opinions regarding the second advent of Christ lead 
them to believe that things must become worse and 
worse upon the earth until he shall personally appear 
for their renewal. But, whatever may be said on the 
question whether the second advent of Christ shall be 
pre-millennial or post-millennial, it is absolutely clear 
to me, that the leaven in this place cannot be taken as 
an emblem of evil. I admit that in Scripture and as a 
figure it is most commonly employed in that sense, and 
that the literal leaven was generally excluded from 
offerings under the Mosaic law. But there was one 
exception ; namely, in the case of the two wave-loaves 
(Lev. xxiii. 17) that formed part of the offering of first- 
fruits ; and it is possible that in the figurative use of the 
term there may be a similar exception to the general 
rule, in the parable before us. For there is no rigid 



58 THE P •ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

uniformity in the symbolism of the Bible, and some- 
times the same thing is used in different places as an 
emblem of different, I would even say of opposite, per- 
sons or principles. Thus, by one sacred writer the 
Devil is described as a lion, while by another Christ is 
spoken of as the Lion of the tribe of Judah ; and in one 
of the Psalms, a flourishing tree is used as a symbol of a 
righteous man, while in another it is employed to illus- 
trate the prosperity of the wicked. If, therefore, the 
context here seems to require us to take the leaven in 
a sense different from or even opposite to that in which 
as a symbol it is generally used by the sacred writers, 
we are at perfect liberty so to do. And this, as it 
seems to me, is very clearly demanded of us, both by 
the terms of the parable itself, and by its relation to 
the whole series of parables of which here it forms a 
part. "The kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven," 
so the words run ; but is it any true or proper descrip- 
tion of the kingdom of heaven, to say that evil will go 
on corrupting the human race until the whole be cor- 
rupted ? Was not that the case, rather, before the Son 
of God came to earth to found his kingdom? Was it 
not, indeed, the very prevalence of the corruption, that 
necessitated the intervention of God in Christ to arrest 
its progress, and overcome its influence ? To take the 
leaven as representing evil, therefore, would make this 
parable a correct description of the progress of the 
kingdom of Satan, and an accurate epitome of the his- 
tory of the race, for the most part, up till the time of 
the coming of Christ; but it would render it absurdly 
inaccurate as a delineation of the kingdom of heaven. 

But our interpretation is demanded also by the rela- 
tion of this parable to the others in the series of which 
it is a member. They all illustrate, in one way or an- 



THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 59 

other, the effect of the preaching of Christ among men. 
The good seed, alike in the stories of the sower and of 
the tares, is the ivord ; and, by all the laws of analogy, it 
should be that also, which is represented by the leaven. 
Moreover, in those parables here in which evil appears, 
the good is seen to be in conflict with it, and is ulti- 
mately separated from it. Thus the tares were at the 
harvest taken out from among the wheat ; and the bad 
fish caught in the net were taken out from among the 
good, and cast away. If, therefore, it had been the Sav- 
iour's purpose to illustrate the progress of evil in the 
world by this parable, we are warranted, from the tenor 
of the others, to conclude that he would have repre- 
sented the leaven as in conflict with something which 
symbolized his gospel, and as being eventually separated 
from or overcome by it ; for it cannot be that he should 
give any countenance to the idea, everywhere else repu- 
diated, that the gospel is to be ultimately vanquished, 
and that Satan is to be left to have universal and undis- 
puted dominion over the world. 

Besides, I remind you of the dualism in the arrange- 
ment of these parables, and ask if we are not warranted 
to expect, that in this couplet, composed of the mustard- 
seed and the leaven, we have the same subject looked at 
from different angles, just as we had in those of the 
tares and the net, and as we are yet to have in those 
of the pearl of great price and the hidden treasure. 

Nor is this all : we must not allow it to be forgotten, 
that while in itself leaven is incipient corruption, and 
therefore an abstractly evil thing, it is yet used by the 
housewife as a good thing for her purpose, which pur- 
pose was also good ; namely, the rjroduction of light 
and wholesome bread. For the object which the woman 
had in view, therefore, the leaven was a good thing, 



60 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

and may warrantably enough be taken as a symbol of 
that whose effect in the world is beneficial. 

For these reasons, then, and without allowing our- 
selves to be drawn into the discussion of millennarian 
theories, which have no more to do with this parable 
than with the others in whose immediate connection it 
is found, we feel bound to take the leaven here as a 
symbol of the good, wholesome, aggressive influence 
which Christ introduced into the world when he came 
to earth, and lived and died, and rose again, as the 
Saviour of sinners. 

But here, too, we must beware of running into merely 
fanciful conceits. We cannot press into significance the 
three measures of meal, as if they denoted either the three 
continents into which the ancients divided the world 
as it was known to them ; or the three sons of Noah, by 
whose descendants the world was peopled after the flood; 
or the three constituent parts of man, — body, soul, and 
spirit : though each of these interpretations has had its 
advocates among expositors. The simple fact is, that 
three measures of meal was a usual quantity for a single 
home-baking; and so they are most naturally specified. 

Neither may we extract any mystical meaning from 
the circumstance that a woman put the leaven into the 
meal, as if thereby the Lord had designed to set before 
us either the work of the Holy Spirit, or the agency of 
the Church ; for, as Arnot has well remarked, " A man 
took the mustard-seed, and sowed it in his field : a 
woman took the leaven, and hid it in three measures 
of meal. The two parables are in this respect strictly 
parallel : in both, an ordinary act is performed, and in 
each it is performed by a person of the appropriate 
sex." x The great truth here illustrated, then, is that 

1 The Parables of Our Lord, as before, p. 114. 



THE MUSTABD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 61 

the Lord Jesus Christ, by his coming and work, intro- 
duced into humanity an element which works a change 
on it, that shall continue to operate until the whole is 
transformed, — therein resembling leaven, hidden by a 
woman in three measures of meal until the whole was 
leavened. 

Thus regarded, some very important things are sug- 
gested by the parable. 

In the first place, it tells us that the coming of Christ 
into the world brought an entirely new influence to bear 
upon it. The leaven was not in the meal by nature : it 
had to be put into it. In like manner, the gospel is not 
a merely natural product. It was not a latent quality 
in the heart of man, needing only favorable circum- 
stances for its development. It is not a human inven- 
tion, but a divine remedy provided for the counteracting 
and overcoming of that evil nature which is inherent in 
the human race. 

We cannot get rid of the fact that men are depraved. 
Explain it as we may, there is moral evil in the world. 
Humanity is tainted, and men of themselves have never 
been able to eradicate the spiritual malady by which 
they are all alike afflicted. So far from that, they have 
never been able to keep themselves from becoming 
worse. How suggestive in this regard are the two 
great visions to which prominence is given in the Book 
of Daniel ! You remember how the image, which had 
its head of gold, deteriorated, as it descended, through 
breast of silver, belly and thighs of brass, and legs of 
iron, to feet part of iron and part of clay. 1 You cannot 
have forgotten either, how, in the vision of the four 
beasts, there was first the lion, then the bear, then the 

i Dan. ii, 



62 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

panther, and then that huge, composite, unnamed mon- 
ster, with great iron teeth, devouring and breaking in 
pieces, and stamping the residue with the feet of it. 1 
We have heard a great deal lately of theories of devel- 
opment ; and this is neither the time nor the place to 
enter upon the consideration of these, so far as they are 
used to explain or account for the present condition of 
the physical universe. But, morally, the only develop- 
ment of man, when left to himself, which history has 
seen, has been downwards ; and the ancient civilization, 
as you may see from the writings of those who have 
described it, was little better than a veneered brutality. 
If, therefore, the progress of evil was to be arrested, and 
men were to be delivered from its influence, it could 
only be through the introduction into the race of some 
agency from without, which, coming into contact with 
it, should purify and ennoble it. Hence, in the dream 
which Nebuchadnezzar saw, that was represented as a 
stone cut out of the mountain without hands ; and in 
the vision of Daniel it is referred to in these words : " I 
saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son 
of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to 
the Ancient of days, and they brought him near be- 
fore him ; and there was given him dominion, and 
glory, and a kingdom, that all people, nations, and lan- 
guages should serve him : his dominion is an everlasting 
dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom 
that which shall not be destroyed." And in the para- 
ble before us, the same thing is illustrated by the hiding 
of the leaven in the meal. Left to itself, human nature, 
bad to begin with, constantly deteriorates. If, there- 
fore, the Lord Jesus Christ had been only a man, and 
the product of his age, he could have done nothing to 

1 Ibid. vii. 



THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 63 

stop that process. Rather, following out the law which 
I have specified, he would have fallen below the age by 
which his was preceded. But he was different from 
other men, — even the God-man, — and so, as the leaven 
operated on the meal because of that active principle in 
it that was different from the meal, Christ, through that 
living power in himself which was different from all 
other men, wrought on the mass of mankind for its 
transformation and assimilation to himself. "By the 
mystery of his holy incarnation, by his cross and pas- 
sion, by his precious death and burial, by his glorious 
resurrection and ascension, and by the coming of the 
Holy Ghost,'" he introduced a new element into human- 
ity, which has been working for its renovation ever since. 
His divine teaching, his spotless example, his atoning 
death, his resurrection life, and his ascension gifts re- 
ceived for men, and shed forth upon men, — all combine 
to make the good news concerning him a regenerating 
power in the world ; and it is the first preaching of this 
good news that is here spoken of as the " hiding " of the 
leaven in the meal. 

How truly it was "hidden," must be evident not only 
from the silence of contemporary historians regarding 
it, but also from the statements made by the Christian 
apostles themselves concerning the beginnings of their 
work. Look at those few Galilean fishermen and peas- 
ants, in that upper room, surrounding a teacher who, 
within a few hours, was to be dragged from their fellow- 
ship, and nailed to a cross. Hear him saying unto them, 
" I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath ap- 
pointed unto me, that ye may eat and drink at my table, 
and sit on thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel ; " 1 
and you may see in them, especially as, a few weeks 

1 Luke xxii. 29. 



64 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

later, they were clothed with the might of the Holy 
Spirit, the first particles of the new leaven. Poor, de- 
spised, contemptible they were, to human view ; and 
thus they may very fitly be spoken of as hidden in the 
mass, which, through their instrumentality, was to be 
permeated and transformed. 

II. But the parable of the leaven suggests, in the 
second place, that the introduction of Christ and his 
kingdom into the world works a change upon the world. 
The leaven assimilates the particles of the meal to itself. 
So Christ, coming into contact with humanity, imparts 
to it his own nature. When he touched the leper, he 
was not defiled, but he communicated his own purity 
to the diseased man: so, when he took human nature 
on him, he was not thereby contaminated, but he con- 
veyed healing to the race. This is seen in a very 
striking way in the history of individuals. Paul, Au- 
gustine, Luther, Bunyan, Newton, and many other 
names, at once leap to our memories as illustrations. 
But it is perhaps more impressively illustrated in the 
case of places. Look, for a crucial instance, at ancient 
Greece. Perhaps the highest culture ever reached 
without Christianity was seen in that classic land. 
There were the most mellifluous language, the loftiest 
eloquence, the noblest art, the acutest philosophy, the 
most spirit-stirring poetry ; but what was the condition 
of the people morally ? Read Mr. Lecky's " History of 
Morals," and he will tell you that it was a mass 
of reeking rottenness. All this went on until a man of 
Tarsus made his appearance, preaching the incarnation 
and the cross, and pointing his hearers to " the Lamb 
of God, that taketh away the sin of the world ; " and 
then even in Corinth, the very capital of the world's 



THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 65 

iniquity, a check was given to the prevailing corruption, 
so that, after naming some of the worst sorts of sinners, 
Paul could write to the converts in that city, "Such 
were some of you ; but ye are washed, but ye are sancti- 
fied, in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of 
our God." 1 Nor is that a solitary instance. It has 
always been so ; it is so to-day. It has wrought a 
similar change in Madagascar, in Fiji, and in many of 
the islands of the Pacific, and nearer home in some of the 
streets and lanes of our own city. Indeed, all the cor- 
rective agents that are successfully at work upon the 
moral condition of humanity, whether at home or abroad, 
may be traced up to Christ and Christianity ; and wher- 
ever the gospel is fairly, honestly, earnestly, and prayer- 
fully tried, it is successful as " the power of God," in 
"turning men from darkness to light, and from the 
power of Satan unto God." 

But this change, real and assimilating in its nature, 
is gradual in its progress. The leaven works on the 
particles of the mass next it, and by transmuting them 
makes them also leaven, which in its turn operates on 
that with which it comes into contact. The change is 
wrought in detail, and on particle by particle. So Chris- 
tianity regenerates the individual, and through him the 
family, and, through the aggregate of such families, 
society at large. It is not volcanic in its character, 
working through shocks like those of an earthquake ; 
but rather gradual, constant, pervasive, like the opera- 
tion of the leaven. We have seen already how it com- 
menced in the adhesion of John and Andrew to Christ ; 
and if we transfer our starting-point to the day of Pen- 
tecost, we have the same fact illustrated. Beginning 
at Jerusalem, it found its earliest converts among the 

i 1 Cor. vi. 11. 



66 THE PARABLES OF OUB SAYIOUB. 

chosen people ; but very soon, led in a way which, they 
knew not, its disciples went to work among the Gen- 
tiles. After that it was taken from one centre of influ- 
ence to another, and left to operate in each. Paul 
"hid" it in quiet places in Philippi, Thessalonica, 
Corinth, Athens, Rome ; and such was its vitality, that, 
within a century or two after his martyrdom, Tertullian 
could write to the Roman emperor, with perhaps a dash 
of rhetorical exaggeration, but yet with substantial 
truth, " We are but of yesterday, and we have filled 
every thing that is yours, — your cities, islands, free 
towns, castles, council-halls, the very camps, all classes 
of men, the palace, the senate, and the forum. We have 
left you nothing but your temples. We can outnumber 
your armies. There are more Christians in a single 
province than men in all your legions." It is unhappily 
true, that in the course of centuries Christianity became 
corrupt, and lost much of its aggressive and assimilat- 
ing force ; but with the era of the Reformation it re- 
gained its power through the recovery of its purity, and 
with occasional times of apparent retrocession it has 
been in the main steadily advancing ever since. But 
probably the greatest progress which it has ever made 
in the history of the world has been seen during the 
present century. Almost within the period of two 
generations, the Bible has been translated into two hun- 
dred different languages : missionaries have gone to the 
East and to the West, to the North and to the South, 
and have, in many instances, already created a new 
civilization by their efforts. Every month is bringing 
fresh reports of their success, and almost every year 
is opening up new fields for their entrance. The Wall 
of China has not been able to exclude this leaven from 
that marvellous empire. Not twenty years have elapsed 



THE MVSTABD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 67 

since Japan was open to receive it ; and now the island 
of Corea has been entered, and we may look for new 
proofs of its power in that land which has been so long 
hermetically sealed from the outside world. With the 
exception of probably not more than one or two coun- 
tries, all nations are now open to its missionaries. 
We could send its preachers almost anywhere, if we 
had but the men to send, and the money to sustain 
them. Shall we not, then, push on, and see the fulfil- 
ment of the prediction, "The mountain of the Lord's 
house shall be established in the top of the mountains, 
and all nations shall flow unto it " ? 

For — and this is the last thought in the parable — 
the change wrought by the introduction of Christianity 
into the world is to be universal. The leaven continued 
to operate on the meal until the whole was leavened ; 
and so the kingdoms of the world are to become the 
kingdom of Christ. Many attempts to set up a univer- 
sal monarchy by force have been made, but they have 
all been disastrous failures. Nebuchadnezzar, Cyrus, 
Alexander, Caesar, Napoleon, each in his turn was am- 
bitious to subdue the world. But they all lacked that 
which was needful for success, for force alone will not 
suffice for such an achievement. The cross, and not the 
sword, is here the conquering influence. The might, 
not of one who slays, but of One who was slain, is here 
the potent spell. Love, not violence, is the real leaven ; 
and universal empire is to be His, over whose cradle 
the heavenly host sang the prophetic anthem, " Glory 
to God in the highest, peace on earth, and good-will to 
men." To the mere superficial observer, indeed, who 
thinks of the vast disproportion now existing between 
the population of even nominally Christian lands, and 
that of those whose inhabitants are Buddhists, Moham- 



68 THE PAH ABLE S OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

medans, and heathens, such an expectation may seem 
little better than a " devout imagination." But when 
he takes a wider sweep, and goes more deeply into the 
matter, he may see reason to alter his opinion. Astron- 
omers calculate the orbit and period of a planet, by 
taking observations of it at different and distant inter- 
vals ; and from the comparison of these, they can 
predict with perfect accuracy both the course it will 
follow and the times which it will keep. Now, if we 
will take a forecast of the future history of the king- 
dom of Christ on similar principles, from the past, we 
shall be led to regard the universal diffusion of the 
gospel as among the most certain of future things. Let 
your first observation be made in the days of Paul, 
your second in the time of Constantine, your third in 
the age of the Reformers, your fourth in the generation 
of the Wesleys and the Whitefields, and your fifth at 
the present hour, and you will see reason to conclude 
that if the churches of Christ will but rise to their 
responsibility, and seize their opportunity, we are not so 
very far as some may suppose from the universal tri- 
umph of the gospel. For the greatest rapidity in its 
progress may be expected at the last, since every new 
convert becomes a new leavening agent ; and so the 
advancement must be in a more accelerated ratio than 
that either of arithmetical or of geometrical progression. 
Shortly before I came first to this country, I clipped a 
paragraph from an English newspaper, which told that 
a grain of wheat that had been picked up by an 
admirer of royalty, as it fell five years before from the 
hand of the Prince of Wales, had, by being sown, and 
its product sown again year after year, brought forth 
within that period as much as could, in the sixth year, 
be drilled into sixteen acres of land. Who can calcu- 



THE MUSTARD-SEED, AND THE LEAVEN. 69 

late how much land might be sown with its increase 
now ? And so, if ive would only catch as eagerly and 
sow as diligently the seed that has fallen from the hands 
of Christ, we might soon be able, with the fruit thereof, 
to cover the whole earth. 

The sum of the matter, then, as brought before us in 
these parables, is this: Insignificant as the beginnings of 
Christianity were, the hope of the world lies in its dif- 
fusion ; and that result will certainly be finally attained. 
It will change the character of the people among whom 
it is proclaimed, and by whom it is accepted ; and it will 
go on in its regenerating course, until " men shall be 
blessed in Christ, and all nations shall call him blessed." 
But this diffusion of the gospel over the world is to be 
brought about by the agency of those who have already 
received it ; and to us in this age, and in this land, God 
has given the high privilege of laboring in this benefi- 
cent enterprise. Shall we accept this privilege, or de- 
cline it ? And, if we decline it, have we ourselves been 
leavened ? These are the questions which I desire to 
leave with you to-night. 



TO THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



THE HIDDEN TREASURE, AND THE PEARL 
OF GREAT PRICE. 

(Matt. xiii. 44-46.) 

The parables are two, but the subject illustrated by 
both is the same. There is iudeecl one point of differ- 
ence between them, which will come up as we proceed; 
but in the main they both deal with the intrinsic pre- 
ciousness of the kingdom of heaven, and the willing- 
hood with which the individual man, when his eyes have 
been opened to perceive that preciousness, sacrifices 
every thing that is inconsistent with his possession 
thereof. 

The incident described in the former of the two may 
well enough have been a literal fact. In those ancient 
days, there was little trade in which men could embark ; 
no banks in which they could lodge their money, and 
no safe-deposit vaults on whose security they could 
depend. It was natural, therefore, that they should 
seek to preserve their savings by hiding them in some 
secret place ; and so they very commonly buried them 
in the earth. It often happened, however, that, when a 
man had thus concealed his treasure, the secret of the 
place into which he had put it died with himself, so 
that it remained concealed until some luck}' discoverer 
stumbled unexpectedly upon it. For the times were un- 
settled ; and a sudden invasion of enemies might lead 



THE TEE A SURE AND THE PEARL. 71 

many to hide their riches in the ground, and flee for 
their lives, in the hope — alas ! too often disappointed — 
that they would soon return and recover them. Thus 
it was, as Guthrie * has quaintly put it, that " the earth 
became a bank in which was accumulated, during the 
course of ages, a vast amount of unclaimed deposits." 
On such a " treasure," the man described in the parable 
accidentally came, when he was, perhaps, engaged in 
some common and ordinary pursuit. Then, having sat- 
isfied himself of its value, he obliterated all traces of 
his discovery ; and, without making any one aware 
of his motive, he sold all that he had, in order that he 
might buy the field wherein he had made his " find." 

In the second of the parables, we see a travelling 
merchant pursuing his regular business as a dealer in 
pearls, which he bought and sold for purposes of gain. 
He was no mere jewel-fancier hunting for rare and val- 
uable gems which he might put into his collection, but 
a merchant whose trade was in pearls ; and, finding one 
of surpassing value, he went and sold all that he had, 
and bought it, congratulating himself the while that he 
had made a splendid investment. 

Thus each of these men discovered that which he 
accounted of supreme value, and took means to obtain 
it for himself. The one came upon it, as it were, by 
accident ; and the other found it as he was prosecuting 
that which he had made the business of his life. Therein 
they differed from each other ; but so soon as the discov- 
ery was made, each took earnest measures to make the 
good thing which he had found his own, and therein 
they were alike. Now, the Saviour says that the king- 
dom of heaven is like them both. In what precisely, 
then, does the resemblance consist? The question is 

1 The Parables of Christ, by Thomas Guthrie, D.D., p. 152. 



72 THE P ARABLES OE OUE SAVIOUB. 

important : and we may perhaps give the best answer 
to it - -ing to show, first, what the parabl— k 
not teach; and, second, what the truths are which they 
were specially intended to illustrate. 

The treasure, and the pearl of great price, both rep- 
resent salvation through Jesus Christ, which, rightly 
estimated, is M more to be desired than gold, yea, much 
fine gold.*' It brings to us what money cannot 
namely, forgiveness of sins, and regeneration of char- 
acter. It imparts to lis what riches cannot secure; 
namely, happiness of heart. It is, in itself, a posses-: n 
which moth cannot corrupt, and no thief can steal. It 
is an abiding joy, valuable not only to him who has it, 
but also, in a very important sense, to all with whom he 
comes into contact. It is. in a word, the chief good, 
the "one thing needful," the great end to which all 
earthly goods, even at their best, are but as means, 
and must be utterly and entirely subordinate .. 

So far all is clear. But no analogy will hold at every 
point, and we shall make the wildest work in our exposi- 
tion, even of the Saviour's parables, if we attem pt :: 
run the parallel through in every particular. Let us 
carefully note, therefore, what those things in these 
parables are, which must not be pressed into spiritual 
significance. 

Observe, then, in the first place, that they do not 
teach that the blessing of salvation through Christ is 
confined to any one particular enclosure. This treasure 
could not have been found anywhere else than in that 
special field, and so many have attempted to limit the 
\ ssibility of obtaining salvation to one particular place. 
It has been alleged, for example, that the field here is 



THE TREASURE AND THE PEARL. 73 

the church ; and from that assertion the inference has 
been drawn, that men can find salvation only in the 
church. Now, I do not undervalue the organization of 
the visible Church. It is Christ's own ordinance, and 
as such we ought to give it all the importance which 
he has attached to it. It is, indeed, indispensable for 
the edification of its own members, for the maintenance 
of gospel ordinances, and for the diffusion of the gospel 
at home and abroad. All efforts for the attainment of 
these ends, which are put forth outside of the church, 
and independently of it, are in their nature sporadic 
and ephemeral, lacking that element of permanence 
which Christ declared that his Church should possess, 
when he said that "the gates of Hades should not 
prevail against it." For all these objects, therefore, I 
magnify the church. But to say that is one thing, and 
to limit salvation to connection with the church is quite 
another. Yet that is done by those who associate re- 
generation with baptism, and affirm that he who par- 
takes of the Lord's Supper is ipso facto Christianized. 
But the truth, as many passages of Scripture attest, is 
just the reverse. A man becomes connected with the 
church through his union to Christ: he does not become 
united to Christ through his connection with the church. 
Christ is the door; through him, men enter into the 
church. They pass, as already saved, into its courts ; 
and, therefore, it will not do to say that salvation is to 
be found alone within its pale. 

Others have affirmed that the field here represents 
the Bible, and they have alleged that it is only by dig- 
ging diligently into its depths that men can discover 
the priceless treasure of salvation. Now, I can not, I 
dare not, speak disparagingly of that Book, the sev- 
eral parts of which were given through ^holy men of 



74 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

old,"' who " spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost.'' It is in itself a treasure " better than gold or 
silver," and multitudes have found Christ and his salva- 
tion through the study of its pages. But still it is not 
true that salvation is possible only for those who have 
that book in their possession. Man}* were saved, through 
him, before at least the New-Testament portion of it 
was reduced to writing at all ; and multitudes still are 
saved to whom faith has come by hearing rather than 
by reading. We cannot, therefore, accept the view of 
those who would identify even the Sacred Scriptures 
with the field which contained the hidden treasure. 
The truth is, that salvation always comes through faith 
in Jesus Christ ; and wherever one is confronted with 
him, and has his eyes opened to the perception of his 
" unsearchable riches," that to him is what the field was 
to the man who found the treasure in it. It may be the 
reading of the Scriptures ; or the hearing of a faithful 
discourse in the sanctuary ; or the perusal of a book 
which he has taken up for quite another purpose than 
to find salvation in it ; or a conversation with a fellow- 
man in some casual interview; or the shock of some 
terrible calamity under which 

" The light of sense 
Went out, but with a flash that has revealed 
The invisible world." 

But, in whatsoever connection it is that a man first 
discovers Christ, and has a glimpse of his salvation, that 
to him is the field of the former of these parables, and 
the coming on the pearl of great price of the latter. A 
glorious opportunity with infinite possibilities of spirit- 
ual blessing through Christ in it, — that, anywhere, is the 
coming on the treasure in the field, or the meeting of 



THE TREASURE AND THE PEARL. 75 

the man who has the priceless pearl ; and the determi- 
nation, at any sacrifice, to embrace that opportunity 
and improve it, is the selling of all he has to buy it. 

Now, when we have got to this apprehension of the 
case, it is easy to see, in the second place, that these 
parables are not to be construed as teaching that salva- 
tion is a thing which a man can buy. " It cannot be 
gotten for gold." That is now one of the simplest com- 
monplaces of the pulpit. But it was not so always. 
We cannot forget Tetzel and his drum, though Luther 
so effectually silenced the one, and made a hole in the 
top of the other. There was a time when indulgences 
were sold for money, and men could buy what Chaucer 
called "pardons come from Rome all hot." But it is 
not needful now that I should expose the hollowness of 
all such pretensions ; for there is little danger, I should 
hope, of any one of you supposing that you can buy 
salvation as you would a jewel or a piece of land. 
More insidious by far is the temptation to imagine 
that we can deserve it by our deeds. But that also is a 
delusion. For even a perfect deed has no merit in it to 
atone for sin ; and, besides, salvation, being not a con- 
dition of security only, but also and mainly a charac- 
ter, cannot be obtained in any such way. It is not a 
commodity outside of the man, which he can transfer 
to himself ready-made by purchase : it is a nature 
within him, and that can be imparted and fostered only 
by God. But how can we purchase that, or any thing 
else, from him? What can we offer to him, that is not 
already mortgaged to him? Hence, if we are ever to be 
saved, it must be by grace ; and, whatever else the pur- 
chase of the field and the pearl may signify, it cannot 
mean that it is possible for us to buy from God, the 
regeneration of our souls. 



76 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

But still again, thirdly, we must not suppose that the 
parable of the finding of the hidden treasure counsels 
concealment in the matter of our salvation, or teaches 
that the discovery of it in Christ is a thing which any 
one needs hide. When this man first saw the treasure, 
he covered it up again, lest any one should discover the 
value of the field, and outbid him in its purchase ; and 
then, having made all his preparations, he went and 
bought the land. In all this he acted like a shrewd 
and unscrupulous man of the world, and a great deal of 
unnecessary discussion has been carried on over his con- 
duct. But it is not in this part of his procedure that 
the point of the parable is to be found; and, in employ- 
ing his eagerness to get possession of the field, for the 
purpose of illustrating the earnestness with which the 
true convert gives up every thing that is inconsistent 
with his possession of salvation, we are not to suppose 
that our Lord meant to express approval of his conceal- 
ment of his discovery from him to whom, of right, the 
property belonged. According to the Jewish law, all 
such " treasure trove " rightfully belonged to the man on 
whose land it was found ; and so the clear duty of the 
finder was to give to the owner notice of that which 
he had discovered. Without any hesitation, therefore, 
I condemn that part of his conduct, even as I condemn 
the dishonesty of the unjust steward, and the stolidness 
of the unjust judge. The analogy of the parable, how- 
ever, does not turn on that, but rather on the joyful 
readiness with which he gave up every thing in order 
to get possession of that which he knew to be worth 
far more than all he had. And, therefore, we must not 
imagine that there is any deep spiritual meaning in his 
hiding of the treasure again, after he had first discov- 
ered it : least of all must we suppose that it enjoins, or 



THE TBEASUEE AND THE PEARL. 77 

even recommends, the convert to conceal his joy in his 
finding of salvation through Jesns Christ. Men hide 
that of which they are ashamed, but why should we be 
ashamed of Jesus and his salvation ? Reason good has 
he to be ashamed of us, but surely we need never hang 
our heads for him. Men hide that which they are afraid 
of losing, or of having stolen from them. But who can 
deprive us of that which is within us ? Our fellow-men 
can obtain the same blessing without taking from us the 
least degree of its enjoyment. Why, then, should we 
conceal it from them? Moreover, no man has any 
exclusive property in salvation. Who can bottle up 
the sunshine, or seek to keep that from his neighbor ? 
Equally vain it is for any one to think that he can 
keep salvation all to himself. Indeed, if any such ideas 
enter his mind, it becomes a question whether he has 
himself been saved at all. For even as, when Jesus of 
old came to a village, it is written that " he could not 
be hid," so, when his salvation comes into a heart, it 
connot be buried or concealed there. No, it will make 
the eye sparkle with an unwonted brightness. It will 
irradiate the countenance with a light divine, " that never 
was on sea or shore." It will pervade the conversation 
with a new and gracious seasoning. It will transfigure 
the conduct with a glory akin to that of the Master, 
when the white lustre of his deity shone through the 
fleshly veil of his humanity on the brow of Hermon. 
Hide this treasure ! One may as well seek to confine 
the irrepressible force of steam, as to prevent that new 
life which Christ puts within the heart, from making 
itself seen or felt wherever the man is. Evermore, 
like Peter, he will have to say, "we cannot but speak ; " 
and, as in the case of Paul, there will be a "necessity" 
on him which will impel him to give it expression. If 



78 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

it can be hidden, it has not come from Christ, and is 
not genuine. If it be from him, it will reveal itself at 
the cost of any sacrifice, and in spite of any obstacle. 

So much for the negative side of my subject. Now 
let us turn to the consideration of the positive, and see 
if we can bring out what these parables were really 
meant to teach. 

And here, in the first place, we may observe that 
they illustrate the different ways in which men come 
to the discovery of the greatness of the salvation that 
is in Christ Jesus. We can see a clear distinction 
between this man, who, when he was not looking for 
any thing of the kind, came upon the treasure in the 
field, and the merchant whose business it was to seek 
for goodly pearls, and who, having found in the course 
of his search a certain pearl of great price, took means 
to possess himself of that. The former is an instance 
verifying the prophet's words, " I am found of them that 
sought me not : " the latter is an illustration of the truth 
of the promise, " those that seek me earnestly shall find 
me ; " and always, in the history of the Church, there 
have been cases-in abundance of both kinds. The woman 
of Samaria who went out on her ordinary errand to the 
well, and found Christ and his salvation there, is an ex- 
ample of the one : Nicodemus, who came as a genuine 
truth-seeker to Jesus, by night, is a specimen of the 
other. Zacchseus, who went out from curiosity to see 
the prophet of Nazareth, belonged to the former class ; 
and the Ethiopian treasurer, who was studying the 
prophecies of Isaiah when Philip came to give him 
instruction in their meaning, must be numbered with 
the latter. Paul on his way to Damascus, breathing out 
threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the 



THE TREASURE AND THE PEARL. 79 

Lord, but confronted by the Christ with the question, 
" Why persecutest thou me ? " must be enrolled in the 
former; and the noble Bereans, who searched the Scrip- 
tures daily, find their place in the latter. The careless 
sinner, engrossed in worldly business or earthly pleas- 
ure, until all at once, he knows not how, his eyes are 
opened " to see the invisible," is represented by the one : 
the anxious inquirer, earnestly seeking for something 
that shall raise him above himself, and resting not until 
he finds that in Christ, is represented by the other. 

Now, this presentation of the case suggests two or 
three practical applications which find their fitting place 
just here. It is fraught, in the first place, with encour- 
agement to the genuine seeker. If God is thus so good 
sometimes to those who are not seeking, much more will 
he keep his word to those who are. So let me urge 
them to persevere with earnest diligence and ardent 
prayer. In the very eagerness of your search, you have 
already begun to find. Your sincerity is the prophecy 
of your success. Yea, who knows but you may find the 
goodly pearl now, as I assure you that Jesus is here 
willing and waitiDg to be gracious unto you? Hearken 
to these words of his own : " Wherefore do ye spend 
money for that which is not bread, and your labor for 
that which satisfieth not ? Hearken diligently unto me, 
and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight 
itself in fatness. Incline your ear, and come unto me ; 
hear, and your soul shall live." 1 

But to those who have not been seeking, there is here 
also a lesson of importance. There may be some such 
with us in this place now. They may have come hither, 
perhaps, with no definite purpose. They may be here 
only to pass an hour or two in a day that is always a 

i Isa. lv. 2. 



80 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

weariness to them. Possibly they may have come simply 
to oblige a friend, or to gratify some curiosity about the 
preacher. The last thing they were dreaming of was 
their salvation. And, lo! here in this description of 
themselves, this telling them of 4 * all things that ever 
they did,*' this setting before them of the sublime real- 
ities of salvation as of infinitely greater moment than 
all the best things of earth, they feel themselves con- 
fronted with Christ, and have their eyes opened, as they 
cannot doubt by God's own Spirit, to the transcendent 
importance of their eternal interests. O friends ! this, 
this is the field in which you have come upon your 
" trove." I rede you, therefore, to beware how you deal 
with your opportunity, and I beseech you not to let it 
pass without securing the treasure. See that, like Paul, 
you apprehend that for which you are now apprehended 
of him. 

But think again, not every man comes unexpectedly 
upon such a " find " as this man discovered. Not every 
careless sinner is thus casually confronted by Christ. 
Therefore be not tempted — you whose hearts have not 
yet been moved — to go on as you have been doing, 
in the vague expectation that something like the history 
of the Samaritan woman will be repeated in your case. 
You have no right to expect any thing of the kind. 
The promise is only to the seeker: therefore give up 
your carelessness, and begin your search. 

Passing now to another point, I remark, in the second 
place, that these parables may fairly teach us that salva- 
tion is a matter of individual appropriation. This man 
in the field was not content merely with seeing the 
treasure, and the merchant was not satisfied simply 
with looking on the pearl : neither of them rested until 
he had made the prize his own. And, in like manner, 



THE TREASURE, AND THE PEARL. 81 

salvation is not a blessing to me until I have accepted 
it on Christ's terms. We are not saved in the gross ; 
but the Lord Jesus deals with us each alone, and each 
must decide for himself what he will do in the premises. 
My appropriation of his grace will not avail for you, 
neither will yours avail for me. Each here must an- 
swer for himself. Only that which I make my own can 
be to me a treasure ; and Scripture everywhere insists 
on the necessity of this appropriation of Christ, in 
order to salvation. It is indeed the truth that under- 
lies all its symbolic references to Christ. Thus, Jesus is 
the bread of life ; but he is of no more avail to me, with- 
out my faith in him, than bread is unless I eat it. He 
is the water of life ; but He is of no more value to me 
without my acceptance of him by faith, than water is 
unless I drink it. He is the light of the world ; but he 
will do me no more good, without my believing reception 
of him into my heart, than the light will unless I open 
my shutters to admit it into my room. He is only a 
Saviour, or at most the Saviour, until I believe in him : 
when I believe in him, he becomes my Saviour. This 
appropriation, therefore, it is that is here symbolized 
by purchase. We make Christ our own by believing in 
him, and giving up every thing that is inconsistent with 
our possession of him, as really as this merchant made 
the pearl his own by buying it. This is vital, essential, 
indispensable. If the anchor do not reach the bottom, 
it might as well never have been dropped, and there is 
in such a case practically no bottom. If the drowning 
man will not seize the rope, it might as well never have 
been thrown to him, and there is for him practically no 
rope. In like manner, if we will not believe in Jesus, 
and give him the place which he demands as Lord and 
Sovereign of our hearts and lives, there might as well 



82 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

for us have been no Saviour ; for he is not our Saviour. 

sinner ! will you not make the Saviour yours now. by 
resigning yourself, your all, to him, and accepting him 

or only Saviour and Sovereign ? 
But finally here, these parables teach us that the 
perception of the value of salvation in Christ makes a 
man happy to part with every thing that is inconsistent 
with its possession. The merchant made a good invest- 
ment when he bought the pearl, even at such a price. 
He was getting more than he gave. And the finder of 
the treasure had no sadness in his heart when he sold 
all that he had to buy the field. Herein, indeed. — in 
this " for joy thereof," of which multitudes lose sight, 
which perhaps the vast majority of readers never s^r. — 
is the gem of the parable of the hidden treasure ; and, if 

1 might, T would fain set it sparkling and prominent in 
the ring of my discourse. This man did not regret the 
selling of all that he had for the purchase of the field. 
He did not go round whimpering about the sacrifice he 
was making, or the self-denial he was practising. He 
gave much, but he got far more ; and the joy of the 
getting swallowed up and into itself the pain of the 
giving. Now, in this it is, that he truly resembles 
the genuine Christian convert. You remember how 
the young ruler M went away sorrowful," wedded to his 
possessions ; and here we have the true explanation of 
his making " the great refusal." He had no adequate 
conception of the value of Christ and his salvation. He 
saw not the infinite unsearchableness of the riches that 
are hidden in Christ. If he had, there would have been 
no hesitation in his heart, but u fc ':;/ thereof'' he 
would have parted with every thing that stood in the 
way of his making them his own. Do not imagine that 
in saying this I am in any way exaggerating. Look at 



THE TREASURE, AND THE PEARL. 83 

Paul. We have seen how he, like this man, came upon 
his treasure " in the field." Now hear how he appreci- 
ated it. Men standing outside of him, and seeing only 
what he gave up, might call him a fool ; but in sober 
truth, even when tried by a purely commercial stand- 
ard, he was a wise and far-seeing spiritual merchant. 
Thus he speaks : " What things were gain to me, those 
I counted loss for Christ. Yea, doubtless, and I count 
all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge 
of Christ Jesus my Lord." Here is no regretful look 
upon the past, no grudging of what he had given up, 
no chafing under what men would call self-denial ; but 
rather a rejoicing over the super-excellency of the 
knowledge of Christ. We see the same thing at a later 
day in Augustine, when describing the crisis of his con- 
version, and how easy he found it, through this joy, 
to give up all those pleasures of sin which he had long 
dreaded to be obliged to renounce, which had long held 
him fast bound in the chains of evil custom, and which 
if he renounced, it had seemed to him that life would 
not be worth the living, he exclaims, " How sweet did it 
at once become to me, to want the sweetness of those 
toys ! and what I feared to be parted from was now a 
joy to part with. For thou didst cast them forth from 
me, thou true and highest sweetness. Thou castedst 
them forth, and, for them, enteredst in thyself, sweeter 
than all pleasures." l 

Thus, my brethren, that which to the eye of the 
worldling, looking from without, seems in the Christian 
to be self-denial and self-sacrifice, is, in the experience 
of the Christian himself, supreme satisfaction with the 
Lord Jesus. His old companions pity him because, to 
their thinking, he has had to give up so much ; but he 

1 Trench on the Parables, pp. 124, 125.. 



84 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

is inwardly rejoicing that lie has gained so much more. 
The man who is wedded to the world considers that the 
Christian life is a poor, humdrum affair, and pities the 
victim, who, as he phrases it, has to say of this and that 
form of worldly pleasure, " I cannot go into it." But 
the Christian himself has no longer any joy in such 
things, by reason of the joy that excelleth which he 
has in Christ. He thinks not of sacrifice in regard to 
them, for he has ceased to relish them. With him, it is 
not "I cannot go," but, rather, " I have no desire to go" 
These things are nothing to him now, because Christ 
and his salvation are so much more than these ever 
were. It is no sacrifice to the matron mother, with her 
baby in her arms, to give up the doll that charmed her 
as a little girl ; and in the same way, it is no sacrifice 
to the Christian to part with the myriad shams of happi- 
ness which the world pursues, since God in Christ has 
put the divine reality within his heart. Spare your pity, 
then, ye votaries of the world. The Christian has 
"meat to eat that ye know not of; " for, in the serene 
altitude of his fellowship with God, he does not miss 
the paltry pleasures of which you make so much. 

And if there be any here who are saying within their 
hearts, " I would become a Christian, but there is so 
much that I must give up," may God open their eyes 
to the perception of the real treasure that is in Christ ; 
and then, when they have made the sacrifice, they, too, 
will admit that the compensations of discipleship are 
infinitely greater than all that they have abjured. I 
cannot prove that to them by demonstration. It can 
be known only by experience ; but from our own trial 
of it, there are multitudes of us who affirm that it has 
been so. I ask them, therefore, to have such faith in 
us as to make the sacrifice on our showing. May God 



THE TREASURE, AND THE PEARL. 85 

even now reveal to you the riches of his grace in Christ, 
and move you at this moment to make the great ac- 
ceptance, that, like the good Ethiopian, you, too, may 
go on your way rejoicing; and it will not be long until 
you come back exclaiming, "The half had not been told 
us. Now we believe, not because of your saying, but 
because we have heard him ourselves, and know that 
tfais is indeed the Saviour of the world." 



86 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 



VI. 

THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 

(Matt, xviii. 23-35. J 

The key to the interpretation of this parable hangs 
upon the door through which we enter on its perusal. 
The Lord had been speaking on the duty of dealing 
tenderly with " the little ones " of his kingdom, and 
was led thereby to treat of the manner in which his 
disciples should conduct themselves towards those who 
had trespassed against them. His injunction was to 
this effect : " If thy brother shall trespass against thee, 
go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone : 
if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. 
But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or 
two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses 
every word may be established. And if he shall neg- 
lect to hear them, tell it unto the church; but if he 
neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a 
heathen man and a publican." 1 Thereby, as is quite 
plain, he laid the responsibility for seeking a reconcilia- 
tion primarily upon him who had received the wrong. 
The initiative was to be taken by him ; and it was only 
after all proper exertions had been made by him in 
vain, that he was at liberty to treat the wrong-doer as 
" a heathen man and a publican." 

i Matt, xviii. 15-17. 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 87 

This, yon will observe, is precisely the opposite of 
the u code " of the world upon the subject. Commonly 
men in such circumstances wait until the offender 
comes to them With a confession and an apology ; and 
even then they consider it to be a matter of simple 
option on their part, whether or not they will forgive 
him. If they do, they take credit to themselves for 
magnanimity; but if they do not, they think that no 
one has a right to blame them. But the course which 
Christ has enjoined is entirely different. He does not 
command the injured party to treat the whole matter 
with indifference, and take no notice whatever of the 
wrong that has been done to him. That would be com- 
paratively easy, and many who do that flatter them- 
selves that they are forgiving those who have trespassed 
against them. But the Lord's law is that he against 
whom the trespass has been committed should take 
measures to bring the evil-doer to a right sense of his 
guilt, and should freely pardon him on the expression 
of his penitence. If, however, kindly, wise, and repeated 
efforts have failed to bring him to repentance, then the 
offender is to be left to himself; while yet the person 
offended is to dismiss all malice and revenge from his 
heart, and to hold himself ready to recognize the very 
earliest indications of penitence which may be given by 
the other. 

The law thus laid down cuts deep, and the enforce- 
ment of it made a profound impression on the heart of 
Peter, — so profound, indeed, that for once, unlike him- 
self, he did not impulsively and immediately speak 
out about it, but allowed the Lord to go on for a 
season uninterrupted with his discourse. But though 
the Saviour, as he proceeded, was touching on some most 
important matters, and was, indeed, announcing what I 



88 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

may call the magna charta of social worship, 1 it would 
almost seem that Peter had not heard him. Probably 
he had been harboring resentment against some one of 
the twelve ; for, if the harmonizers are right, there had 
just been a dispute among them as to which should be 
the greatest. It is not unlikely, therefore, that some- 
thing had been said by one or more of them which had 
so wronged Peter, that he felt very hardly toward them, 
and therefore he could not get that exhortation of the 
Master out of his head. It had, indeed, most emphatic- 
ally condemned him ; and perhaps like the lawyer who, 
willing to justify himself, said, " Who is my neighbor ? " 
Peter here was seeking for some salve to his conscience 
when he asked, "Lord, how oft shall my brother sin 
against me, and I forgive him? Till seven times?" 
But, alas ! that question only indicated how far he had 
been from really comprehending the words of the Lord. 
For it was not a question of "how often" at all. 
Rather it was a matter of character which was to be 
manifested whensoever the occasion arose. Therefore, 
when Christ replied, " I say not, until seven times, but 
until seventy times seven," — that is (for the answer 
gives a definite for an indefinite number), there can be 
no limit of times, — he added this parable, whereby he 
shows that the forgiving spirit ought always to be in 
the heart of the forgiven man. To carry out the 
Saviour's law, therefore, there is no need to say " how 
often ;" but all that is necessary is to keep constantly 
before us the fact that God has blotted out our trans- 
gressions, and will not remember our sins. 

In the story itself, there is not much that needs 
verbal explication. A king calls all his servants to 

i Matt, xviii. 20. 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 89 

account ; not for a final reckoning, but rather, as it 
would appear, at some unexpected time, that he might 
take note of their fidelity, and discover how the vari- 
ous departments of his kingdom stood. One of these 
servants, probably a satrap or viceroy over some dis- 
tant dependency, was brought to him, — mark the 
expression " was brought," as perhaps indicating his 
reluctance to come, — who proved to be owing ten thou- 
sand talents. This, however reckoned, was an enor- 
mous sum ; amounting, if an Attic talent be taken as 
the unit, to ten millions of our dollars. How he had 
come to be thus involved, we are not told. But he 
had nothing to pay ; and, according to the law and cus- 
tom of the times, the king commanded him to be sold, 
and his wife and children, that so far at least payment 
should be made and the defaulter punished. But at 
the urgent entreaty of the hapless debtor, who passion- 
ately cried, " Have patience with me, and I will pay 
thee all," — though how that was to be accomplished 
does not appear, — the ruler was better to him than 
he asked, " and loosed him, and forgave him the debt." 
" What a load was lifted from the man's heart thereby ! " 
we are apt to say, " and how ready he will be to show 
kindness to others ! " Yes, he might have been, if he 
had really felt it to be a load ; but it seems, both from 
his expression " I will pay thee all," and his after-con- 
duct, that he had not felt it to be very much of a bur- 
den, and so there was little gratitude in his soul. He 
had escaped from that which he feared, and his thoughts 
were more about his own good fortune than about 
his lord's magnaninihVy. "Himself "was the idol of his 
heart ; and so, on " going out " from his lord's pres- 
ence (ah! he would not have attempted it befure his 
master's face), and finding a man who owed him a mere 



90 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

beggarly item of a hundred pence, or about fifteen of 
our dollars, he laid hands on him, and took him by the 
throat, saying, " Pay me that thou owest." This man 
was his fellow-servant, and besought him in precisely 
the same words as he had himself used to his master. 
He was owing only one hundred pence, whereas his own 
debt had been thousands of talents. Still, there was no 
compassion in his heart for him, and he sent him 
remorselessly to prison. Such, conduct, very naturally, 
made his other fellow-servants indignant, and they 
immediately reported it to their lord; who at once 
revoked his clemency, and delivered the heartless 
wretch to the tormentors, saying, " O thou wicked ser- 
vant, I forgave thee all that debt because thou desiredst 
me : shouldst not thou also have had compassion on thy 
fellow-servant, even as I had pity on thee ? " " So like- 
wise," adds the Lord, " shall my heavenly Father do 
also unto you, if ye from jour hearts forgive not every 
one his brother their trespasses." This does not mean 
that God revokes the forgiveness which he has once 
bestowed, for his " gifts and calling " are " without 
repentance," and we must not attempt to force the par- 
allel here into the teaching of any thing like that ; but 
it is a symbolical way of saying that he who will not 
forgive another has not really himself been yet for- 
given. All controversies, therefore, over the bearing 
of this parable on the doctrine of the perseverance of 
the saints, are entirely irrelevant. That matter is not 
in any manner brought up here ; but the whole drift 
and purpose of the parable is to show that he who 
cherishes an unforgiving spirit has never been a saint 
at all, and has never really accepted pardon for him- 
self. As Edersheim has said, " The recall of the king's 
original forgiveness of the great debtor can only be 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 91 

intended to bring out the utter incompatibility of such 
harshness toward a brother, on the part of one who has 
been consciously forgiven by God." 1 Or, as Arnot 
expresses it, " If you get pardon from God, you will 
give it to a brother : if you withhold it from your 
brother, you thereby make it manifest that you have 
not gotten it from God." 2 This is the great thought 
of the parable ; but as a whole the story is so rich in its 
evangelical suggestiveness, that I shall endeavor to 
bring out before you the leading truths which it spe- 
cially emphasizes, and at the same time so to arrange 
and illustrate these, as to give its true climactic force 
to the conclusion which it was designed to establish. 

I. Observe, then, in the first place, as clearly implied 
in this parable, that we are all God's debtors. Debt, in 
the New Testament, is a common figure for sin. That, 
however, does not imply that the obligation under which 
we lie as guilty before God is of a pecuniary sort, and 
such as can be cancelled by the payment of money. 
Duty is a moral thing, not a commercial. The neglect 
to discharge it, or the commission of that which is 
inconsistent with it, constitutes a moral offence for 
which silver and gold have no equivalent. Money and 
duty belong to different departments. If I may use an 
arithmetical formula, they never can be reduced to a 
common denominator. The law of God never can be 
satisfied with a pecuniary fine ; and no one can pur- 
chase exemption from its obligation, or make atonement 
for its violation, by the offering of money. 

But though, in its literal sense, as denoting money 
owed by one to another, the word "debt" cannot be 

i Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, vol. ii. p. 294. 
2 Parables, p. 193. 



92 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

taken as identical with sin ; yet when used figuratively, 
as signifying an obligation which one has failed to meet, 
it may well illustrate what the Scriptures mean by ini- 
quity. For, what is sin ? It is either a failure to come 
up to the standard of God's law, or a transgression of 
its commands ; and he who has committed it is a debtor 
in the sense of owing satisfaction to that moral code 
which he has dishonored. Now, in this sense, we are all 
God's debtors ; for " we have left undone those things 
which we ought to have done, and we have done those 
things which we ought not to have done." So much, I 
suppose, we should all be ready to acknowledge. But 
do we really mean what we say, when we make such a 
confession? Have we any "bill of particulars" in our 
minds at the moment? or do we use the words as a 
mere form, out of which all significance has long since 
departed? The question is important; for low views 
of sin, and false notions as to the nature of their own 
guilt, lie largely at the root of men's indifference to the 
salvation which God has provided. It is an easy thing 
to say, "I am a sinner," but it is another thing to feel 
all that the acknowledgment implies ; and it is to be 
feared, that many who use the language of general 
confession would yet be found emphatically denying to 
their fellow-men that they had committed the sins of 
which their words before God seem to be the acknowl- 
edgment. Alas ! it is too true ; and the sarcasm of those 
who speak of the hypocrisy of such confessions is not 
without warrant in the prayers of many unctuous pro- 
fessors of penitence. Let us be honest with ourselves, 
therefore, that we may be honest witli God. Let us 
compare our character and conduct with the require- 
ments of God's law. Let us measure ourselves, not 
by the standards of conventionalism and custom, but by 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 93 

these words : " Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with 
all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, and 
with all thy strength, and thy neighbor as thyself;" 
and let us see how far short we have come of their 
fulfilment. Let us analyze our conduct in the labora- 
tory of the closet, and with the tests of Holy Scrip- 
ture. Then our confession, instead of being a form, 
will become a reality; and the vague generalities 
which mean so little on our lips will give place to 
acknowledgments of particular sins, accompanied with 
shame and confusion of face for their commission. It 
would be a much healthier sign of the state of our 
consciences, if, instead of simply crying for mercy as 
" miserable sinners," each of us should specify the 
particular sins which he has committed; and for lack 
of that it is, that so many among us feel so little 
real sorrow for guilt, even when we seem to be ask- 
ing for forgiveness. When, therefore, I draw from this 
parable the inference that we are all God's debtors, let 
each of us confess the sins of which he is consciously 
guilty ; and then our acknowledgment, while it is the 
same for all, will be specifically distinct for each, and 
will be at least sincere. 

II. Observe, in the second place, as clearly implied in 
this parable, that none of us has any thing wherewith 
to pay his debt to God. Here, again, we come upon a 
very prevalent error among men. When God calls us 
to a reckoning, by any solemn providence, such as af- 
fliction, bereavement, the loss of worldly possessions, or 
the like, and confronts us with himself, most of us, I 
believe, would be willing to acknowledge our guilt ; but 
comparatively few, I fear, would admit that they could 
do nothing to make amends therefor. This servant said 



94 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

to his king, " Have patience with me, and T will pay thee 
all ; " though where he imagined he was to get such a 
sum of money, is more than I can understand. But it is 
just the same with the sinner and his God. The mo- 
ment his guilt is brought home to him, he is impelled 
to do something or to promise something, in the way of 
wiping out that guilt. Commonly the very last thing 
which he will admit is that he can do nothing to make 
atonement for it. He will go about to establish his own 
righteousness. He will try to make himself better. 
He will promise future obedience, as if that could be a 
satisfaction for the sins of the past. It is thus with him 
as it is too often with business men in a time of embar- 
rassment ; for, no matter how involved his affairs may 
be, the very last thing that a merchant will admit is 
that he is hopelessly insolvent. Hugh Miller, in his 
autobiography, thus describes what he learned by his 
experience as a clerk in the branch bank of Linlithgow: 
" I found I could predict every bankruptcy in the dis- 
trict; but I usually fell short from ten to eighteen 
months of the period in which the event actually took 
place. I could pretty nearly determine the time when 
the difficulties and entanglements which I saw, ought to 
have produced their proper effects, and landed in fail- 
ure ; but I missed taking into account the desperate 
efforts which men of energetic temperament make in 
such circumstances, and which, to the signal injury of 
their friends and the loss of their creditors, succeed 
usually in staving off the catastrophe for a season." 1 
So the sinner, in his attempts to work out his own re- 
demption, sinks only the deeper into the mire. Nor is 
this to be wondered at : for the law demands perfection ; 
and, as his nature is depraved, every new effort which 

1 My Schools and Schoolmasters, pp. 491, 495. 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 95 

lie puts forth, being tainted with that inherent pollution, 
is only the addition of a new item to his guilt. We 
are, therefore, not only God's debtors, but we have, and 
we can have, no assets ; so that we are hopelessly insol- 
vent. We are not only guilty, but helplessly guilty. 
Let that be clearly understood and cordially accepted 
by you all ; for many stumble at this stumbling-stone. 
So long as you seek to establish your own righteousness, 
you are but like a criminal on the tread-wheel, and 
every step descends with you as soon as you attempt to 
raise yourself upon it ; or like a man who seeks to build 
a house upon a quicksand, in which every stone dis- 
appears as soon as it is laid. The simple truth is just as 
Toplady has sung it : — 

" Not the labor of my hands 
Can fulfil thy law's demands ; 
Could my zeal no respite know, 
Could my tears forever flow, 
All for sin could not atone : 
Thou must save, and thou alone." 

For none of us has any thing wherewith to pay God's 
debt. 

III. This leads me to the third thing implied in the 
parable ; namely, that God is willing to forgive us all 
our debt. It is, indeed, the very purpose of revelation 
to make that fact known to men ; and in its proclama- 
tion David and Paul, Isaiah and John, Jeremiah and 
Peter, are in full accord. Take the following passages 
in proof of our assertion : " With the Lord there is 
mercy ; and with him is plenteous redemption, and he 
shall redeem Israel from all his iniquities." " Come 
now and let us reason together, saith the Lord : though 



96 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUn. 

your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow; 
though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." 
" Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous 
man his thoughts ; and let him return unto the Lord, 
and he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for 
he will abundantly pardon." " I will cleanse them from 
all their iniquity whereby they have sinned against me, 
and I will pardon all their iniquities whereby they 
have sinned and whereby they have transgressed 
against me." " If we confess our sins, he is faithful and 
just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all 
unrighteousness." 1 And if the presence of that word 
"just" in this quotation from John should provoke the 
question, how he can be just, and yet freely pardon the 
iniquity of the sinner, the answer is given by Paul: 
" Christ Jesus, whom God hath set forth to be a pro- 
pitiation through faith in his blood for the remission of 
sins that are past, through the forbearance of God, to 
declare, I say, at this time his righteousness, that he 
might be just and the justifier of him which believeth 
in Jesus." 2 Or, again, u He hath made liim to be sin for 
us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the right- 
eousness of God in him ; " so that 4i God was in Christ 
reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their 
trespasses unto them." " In him we have redemption 
through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins." 2 But 
what need I more ? Surely I have quoted enough to 
prove that God is willing frankly to forgive us all our 
debt. He asks no merit. He will accept no price. 
He will not sell pardon, either for our alms, or our fast- 
ings, or our penances, or our tears : for thus has his 
servant declared: "Not by works of righteousness 

1 Ps. csxx. 7, 8; Isa. i. 18; Jer. xxxiii. 8; 1 John i. 9. 

2 Bom. iii. 25, 26; 2 Cor. v. 21; Col. i. 14. 



TUE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 97 

which we have clone, but according to his mercy he 
saves us by the washing of regeneration and the renew- 
ing of the Holy Ghost." l This is the very central truth 
of the gospel, that, indeed, which makes it a gospel, a 
message of good news to men. Let every sinner hear 
it, and rejoice. God is willing frankly to forgive us our 
debt. 

IV. But now, observe in the fourth place, as implied 
in this parable, that the reception of this forgiveness 
by us involves in it the obligation to forgive those of 
our felloiv-men ivho have trespassed against ourselves. 
The servant before us, after having received his lord's 
favor, went and demanded in the most peremptory 
manner the payment of a small debt which a fellow- 
servant owed him ; and because he did not obtain that, 
he cast his poor debtor into prison. This drew upon 
him the condemnation of his lord, who revoked his 
kindness, and delivered him to the tormentors. Now, 
as we have already said, Christ thus teaches in a sym- 
bolical way, that we who have freely received God's 
pardon should also freely forgive those who have 
offended or injured us; and that, if we do not thus 
pardon those who have trespassed against us, we have 
not yet really accepted God's forgiveness. 

But to prevent mistake, let us clearly understand 
how far this obligation extends. It does not imply that 
we are to take no notice whatever of the wrong that has 
been done to us, saying, "What does it matter to me? 
I can afford to let such a one do or say any thing he 
pleases." That would be saving ourselves, perhaps, a 
great amount of trouble ; but it would not be the "gain- 
ing" of our brother, and it would not be forgiveness. 

1 Tit. iii. 5. 



98 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Nay, rather, it would be selfish indifference alike to our 
brother and his guilt. That which is forgiven is a tres- 
pass ; and, while there is to be in our hearts the disposi- 
tion to forgive it, we must also seek to bring our brother 
to the admission that it was a trespass, and to the ex- 
pression of his sorrow for its commission. As Arnot x 
says, " Parallel with forgiveness there must be faithful- 
ness. Faithfulness to the evil-doer himself and to the 
community comes in here to modify, not the nature, but 
the outward form, of forgiving." We must read the 
parable in the light of the plain and explicit commands 
concerning the dealing with an offending brother, as 
these are given in verses 15-17 of this same chapter. 
The obligation, thus interpreted, amounts to this : that 
we should dismiss from our hearts all hatred, malice, 
and uncharitableness toward those who have wronged 
us ; that we should ourselves take the initiative, and open 
a door toward reconciliation, by using means to bring 
the offender to the acknowledgment of his guilt, and 
the acceptance of forgiveness ; and that, when he thus 
confesses his sin and expresses his penitence, we should 
be ready to meet him with our frank and full pardon. 
But if, after we have faithfully and lovingly endeavored 
to set his wrong-doing before him, he continues obsti- 
nate and irreconcilable, tins parable does not teach, and 
neither the word of God nor the spirit of the gospel 
requires, that we should be toward him precisely as if he 
had never injured us, and as if he were the most amia- 
ble person in the world ; for then comes in the precept, 
"let him be to thee as a heathen man and a publican/' 
" There is," as Arnot says, " no virtue in simply per- 
mitting a man to wrong you as often as he chooses, for- 
giving him and doing nothing more." 1 Forgiveness can 

i The Parables of Our Lord, p. 198. 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 99 

be exercised only where the wrong is acknowledged 
and repented of. The noble-minded prisoner who had 
done no wrong would not accept a pardon, because that 
would have been an admission of his guilt. But the 
same thing holds with one who has done wrong. The 
acceptance of forgiveness implies an acknowledgment 
of guilt; and if forgiveness in the right sense of the 
word is to be given by us, or accepted by the man who 
has trespassed against us, we must first bring him to a 
true perception and acknowledgment of guilt. To do 
nothing about it, is not to forgive, and is neither just 
to ourselves, nor kind to the wrong-doer. Willingness 
to be reconciled, together with the use of all proper 
means for the effecting of a reconciliation, and the dis- 
missal from our souls of every thing like vindictive 
feeling, even when a reconciliation is found to be im- 
possible, — these are the things which are especially 
enforced in this striking parable. 

But how comes it that the obligation to cherish this 
forgiving spirit is connected with our reception of God's 
mercy ? To that I reply, that all who really accept 
God's pardon are at the same time renewed into his 
image by the power of the Holy Spirit; and so, resem- 
bling him in character, they seek to do unto others as 
he has done to them. Gratitude to him will take the 
form of forgiving those who have sinned against them- 
selves. Thus, altogether irrespective of any outward 
precept, the suggestions of the Spirit within them would 
impel them to forgive those who trespass against them. 
But there is no lack of outward precept in this case. 
Thus Paul, in writing to the Ephesians, says, "Be ye kind 
one toward another, tender-hearted, forgiving one an- 
other, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you." 1 

l Eph. iv. 32. 



100 TUE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

And again, in his letter to the Colossians, we have 
these words : " Forbearing one another, and forgiving 
one another, if any man have a quarrel against any; 
even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye." l In like 
manner the example of Christ — which is the rule for 
every Christian — teaches the same thing; for in the very 
agony of his passion, at the very time when they were 
nailing him to the cross, there came from his heart to his 
lips that loving intercession, " Father, forgive them, for 
they know not what they do." And in the prayer which 
he gave to his followers, both as a pattern and a form, 
we have this petition : " Forgive us our debts as we 
forgive our debtors ; " a petition which implies that our 
forgiveness of others is to be, not the ground on which 
we ask our own pardon, but the evidence that we are 
cherishing a God-like spirit towards those who have 
offended us. Yet it is a solemn thought, never to be 
forgotten by us, that every time we offer that prayer, we 
do virtually ask God to deal with us as we are dealing 
with others ; and so, in the mouth of a revengeful or 
vindictive person, it is an imprecation of evil on his 
own head. " Conceive," says Augustus Hare, " an un- 
forgiving man, with heart full of wrath against his 
neighbor, with a memory which treasures up the little 
wrongs and insults and provocations he fancies himself 
to have received from that neighbor, — conceive such a 
man praying to God Most High to forgive him his debts 
as he forgives his debtors. What, in the mouth of such 
a man, do these words mean ? They mean — But, that 
you may fully understand their meaning, I will turn 
them into a prayer, which we will call the prayer of the 
unforgiving man : ' O God, I have sinned against thee 
many times from my youth up till now. I have been 

1 Col. iii. 13. 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 101 

often forgetful of thy goodness ; I have not daily 
thanked thee for thy mercies ; I have neglected thy ser- 
vice. I have broken thy laws. I have done many 
things utterly wrong against thee. All this I know ; 
and besides this, doubtless I have committed many 
secret sins, which in my blindness I have failed to 
notice. Such is my guiltiness, O Lord, in thy sight. 
Deal with me, I beseech thee, even as I deal with my 
neighbor. He hath not offended me one-tenth, one- 
hundredth part, as much as I have offended thee ; but he 
has offended me very grievously, and I cannot forgive 
him. He has been very ungrateful to me, though not a 
tenth, not a hundredth part, as ungrateful as I have been 
to thee : yet I cannot overlook such base ingratitude. 
Deal with me, O Lord, I beseech thee, as I deal with 
him. I remember and treasure up every little trifle 
which shows how ill he has behaved to me. Deal with 
me, I beseech thee, O Lord, as I deal with him.' Can 
any thing be more shocking and horrible than such a 
prayer ? Is not the very sound of it enough to make 
one's blood run cold ? Yet this is just the prayer which 
the unforgiving man offers up, every time he repeats the 
Lord's Prayer. For he pra3~s to God to forgive him in 
the same manner in which he forgives his neighbor. But 
he does not forgive his neighbor, and so he prays to 
God not to forgive him. God grant that his prayer may 
not be heard, for he is praying for a curse upon his own 
head ! " 1 

I cannot conclude without pausing for a few moments 
to give emphasis to three facts which are all suggested 
by this parable, and which give tremendous force to the 
lesson which it teaches. 

The first is, that our sins against God are vastly 

1 Alton Sermons, pp. 467, 468. 



102 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

greater than our neighbor's trespasses against us. The 
servant's debt to his lord was ten thousand talents, but 
his fellow-servant's debt to him was a hundred pence : 
so the injuries which others have done or can do to us 
are small and paltry in comparison with the enormity 
of our offences against God. If, therefore, he forgives 
the greater, we may forgive the less. 

The second is, that God himself is not a sinner, and is 
not induced by the consciousness of any guilt of his own 
to show mercy to the transgressor ; but we are contin- 
ually needing not only the forbearance of God, but also 
the long-suffering of our fellow-men. If, therefore, He 
who never offended any one, and does not need any for- 
giveness, so frankly forgives us, how much more ought 
we, who so frequently trespass, both against him and 
our neighbors, to forgive those who trespass against 
ourselves ? 

" Forget not, thou hast often sinned, 
And sinful still must be : 
Deal gently with the erring one, 
As thy God has dealt with thee." 

The third is, that implacability on our part is an evi- 
dence that we are as yet unforgiven by God. " If any 
man have not the spirit of Christ, he is none of his. " 
The tree repeats itself in the framework of every leaf ; 
and if in our lives there be revenge and unforgivingness, 
these things demonstrate that we have no living connec- 
tion with the true vine. An unforgiving Christian is a 
contradiction in terms. u So likewise shall my heaven- 
ly Father do also unto you, if ye from the heart forgive 
not every one his brother their trespasses." Mark these 
words, "my heavenly Father." There are those among 
us who are constantly affirming that it would be incon- 



THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT. 103 

sistent with God's fatherhood, if he should leave any 
unforgiven. But it is not so that the eternal Son has 
revealed to us the fatherhood of God. Nay, rather, just 
because the heavenly Father is love, he must be ever- 
lastingly opposed to a spirit so unlike his own as that of 
the implacable and unforgiving man. Here, indeed, to 
me, is the appalling lesson o*f the parable : that God the 
Father, who is now so willing to forgive us all, must 
and shall leave unforgiven all who cherish and mani- 
fest this unforgiving temper. "Take care how you 
offend me, for I never forgive, " said one man to an- 
other, in the hearing of John Wesley. " Then," said 
the man of God, " I hope you never sin ; for, with what 
measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again." 
God grant that we may all so gratefully accept his for- 
giveness, as to be thereby impelled to seek forgiveness 
from the brethren whom we have wronged, and to 
grant forgiveness to those who have wronged ourselves ! 



104 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



VII. 

THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 

(Matt. xx. 1-16.) 

This parable is perhaps harder to interpret than any 
other which the Saviour uttered. It will serve no good 

o 

purpose to enter upon the controversies which have been 
carried on concerning it by commentators ; yet it is im- 
portant that we should define wherein the difficulties 
connected with its exposition lie, inasmuch as a clear 
apprehension of that may help us to the right solution 
of them. 

Now, in the first place, we cannot disguise it from 
ourselves, that the story, on the face of it, is one which 
is exceedingly improbable. We all feel that as we read 
it, and only our reverence for our Lord prevents us from 
giving expression to that conviction. There is, indeed, 
nothing surprising in a householder going in the morn- 
ing to the market-place to hire laborers to work in his 
vineyard. That was common enough in the times in 
which our Saviour lived. We can conceive, also, of cir- 
cumstances which necessitated the employment of as 
many hands as possible, and which impelled him to go 
out at later hours in the day to send other laborers into 
the vineyard; though when it came to five o'clock in 
the afternoon, and only one working hour remained, we 
do feel it to be rather strange that he should engage 
others for such a brief time. But it is still more unusual 



TIIE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 105 

to find an employer giving as much remuneration to 
those who wrought for one hour, as he did to those who 
wrought for nine or twelve. Josephus indeed tells us 
that the high priest Annas gave the workmen employed 
in repairing or adorning the temple a wdiole day's pay, 
even though they labored only for a single hour ; but 
the very fact of his mentioning such a circumstance 
marks it as unprecedented. It w r as not the custom in 
those ancient days. It is not the custom now. None 
of you who are employers of labor would ever think 
of doing such a thing, as a rule ; and the principles of 
political economy would condemn you, and insure your 
business failure, if you attempted to carry out such a 
plan. This householder, therefore, was no common 
character. He was what would now be called "pecul- 
iar." He was different from others, — eccentric, if you 
choose ; had his own way of doing things, and did not 
care how other people regarded him ; was not actuated 
by ordinary motives, and managed his vineyard on prin- 
ciples which were radically opposite to those in vogue 
among men. But when we come to think it out, we 
shall discover that he must be such an one, if he would 
truly represent God in his dealings with men generally. 
Is it not written, "My thoughts are not your thoughts, 
neither are your ways my ways, saith the Lord. For as 
the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways 
higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your 
thoughts"? If, therefore, this householder had been 
in all respects like every other householder, and his 
actions precisely the same as those of householders in 
general among men, he would have been no proper 
representative of the Head of the kingdom of heaven, 
and his doings would have borne no resemblance to the 
administration of that kingdom which is "not of this 



106 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

world." Hence Ave need not be disturbed about the 
unnaturalness or improbability of trie story as a story. 
Speaking after the manner and standard of men, the 
gospel itself is unnatural and improbable ; and only a 
householder who cared more for the culture of men, than 
for the production of grapes, could rightly represent 
Him who measures service not by its visible result, but 
by the spirit in which it is rendered. 

A second and even more serious difficulty is in the 
fact that the act of this householder seems to be unjust. 
We have all a kind of sympathy with the grumblers 
who say, " These last have wrought but one hour, and 
thou hast made them equal unto us which have borne 
the burden and heat of the day." So common is this 
sympathy, that expositors have tried to remove the diffi- 
culty out of which it arises, by sundry suggestions of 
their own. Some, for example, have said that the house- 
holder's act was grounded in the fact that the late 
comers had done as much in one hour as the early ones 
had performed in twelve ; but there is no word of that 
in the parable, and if that had been the explanation, it 
would have been easy for the householder to vindicate 
himself by saying, " You have no right to complain, 
for, judging [as a modern employer would say] 'by 
the piece,' they have earned as much as you." But in- 
stead of that, he simply falls back upon his right to do 
what he chose with his own. Others have supposed, 
that, while the late comers were paid with a brass dena- 
rius, the others were rewarded with a silver one or with 
a gold one ; and so they tell us that there is one heaven 
for all, yet varying for each in glory and exaltation, 
according to his work on earth. But true as that is, 
for many portions of the Word of God attest it, yet it 
cannot surely be the truth taught here ; for there is no 



THE LABORERS IN TIIE VINEYARD. 107 

hint of it in the parable, and it would have been easy 
for the householder to have justified himself if it had 
been really as this would represent. Nay, if the twelve- 
hour laborers had got a gold denarius, we may be sure 
there would have been no murmuring on their lips. We 
have to admit, therefore, the inequality of the treatment 
given to these laborers ; and we must find the explana- 
tion of it in something else than the quantity of their 
work, — even in that which ordinary earthly employers 
take no thought of, namely, the spirit of the workers. 

A third difficulty arises from the evident impossibility 
of finding spiritual analogues for each of the particulars 
in the parable. We can see that God is the householder, 
and Christ the steward, and the vineyard the Church. 
But when we go down into details, and ask who those 
are who were hired in the morning, and who those are 
who were sent to work at nine, twelve, three, and five 
o'clock respectively ; or how it comes that there should 
be murmurers in the ranks of those who have really 
labored in the Church ; or what the penny represents, 
— we are involved in uttermost perplexity, and cannot 
give a categorical answer to any one of such inquiries. 

Now, these very difficulties prove that the interpreta- 
tion of the parable is not to be sought in any such direc- 
tion ; and indicate that the grumbling workers are to 
be taken rather as the impersonations of an evil princi- 
ple, that is found existing sometimes even in Christian 
hearts, than as actual and distinct entities in the Chris- 
tian Church. They correspond in that particular, pre- 
cisely, with the elder brother in the parable of the 
prodigal son ; and we are to look for that which they 
represent, in a spirit that lurks sometimes even in the 
hearts of believing men, rather than in individuals who 
can be separately and distinctly identified in the church. 



108 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

There is a good deal of elder-brotherliness, even in men 
of Christian character ; and there is ranch of this hireling 
disposition, even in those who must still be reckoned 
genuine disciples. But wherever it is, it vitiates the 
character and service to such a degree, that those who 
have it, though they may be first as regards the dura- 
tion and magnitude of the work which they have done, 
are yet last in the Divine appreciation of that work. 

The parable, therefore, is the exposure of a spirit, 
rather than the portrait of an individual or the descrip- 
tion of a class. It is a story with a purpose, rather 
than an affair of real life ; and that purpose is the con- 
demnation of the hireling disposition which would seek 
to deal with God on the principle of so much for so 
much, and would graduate reward in the manner of 
proportion as we would work a sum in the rule of three. 

This conclusion as to the drift of the parable, which 
we have arrived at from the consideration of the nature 
of the difficulties which beset its interpretation, is thor- 
oughly confirmed when we look at the occasion which 
called it forth. Glancing back to the concluding section 
of the preceding chapter, which ought not to have 
been thus arbitrarily separated from what so closely 
belongs to it, we find that the rich young man had just 
been tested by the Lord, through the searching com- 
mand, " If tliou wilt be perfect, go and sell that thou 
hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure 
in heaven ; and come, follow me." Unable to stand such 
an ordeal, he had gone " away sorroAvful, for he had 
great possessions; " and the incident had led the Saviour 
to remark how hard it was for a rich man to enter into 
the kingdom of heaven. But Peter, speaking first, and 
perhaps also giving expression to thoughts which were 



THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 109 

as really present in the minds of his fellow-disciples as 
in his own, drew a self-righteous contrast between them 
and the youth who had just retired, saying, "Behold, 
we have forsaken all, and followed thee : what shall we 
have therefore ? " The ardent apostle was a good man, 
but the spirit which those words evinced was not a good 
spirit. It was as if he had said to his Lord, " Thou 
didst promise to that wealthy young man, that if he 
gave up every thing, and followed thee, lie should have 
treasure in heaven. But we have done just what thou 
didst ask him to clo : now what shall we have for that ? " 
Knowing the true love which was in Peter's heart for 
him, in spite of this apparently bargaining inquiry, the 
Lord answered with great tenderness, " Verily I say 
unto you, that ye which have followed me, in the regen- 
eration when the Son of man shall sit on the throne of 
his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging 
the twelve tribes of Israel. And every one that hath for- 
saken houses or brethren or sisters, or father or mother, 
or wife or children or lands, for my name's sake, shall 
receive an hundred-fold, and shall inherit everlasting 
life;" that is to say, "For you there shall be special 
honor ; and for all who .do as you have done, there shall 
be abundant compensation and everlasting life at last." 
But the Saviour does not stop there. To have done 
that, would have been to have left unreproved the dis- 
position which showed itself in Peter's words. So he con- 
tinued thus : " But many that are first shall be last, and 
the last shall be first ; " as if he had said, " But take care 
of working in a mere hireling spirit, and for the sake of 
what you are to get : for if you do so, great as your ser- 
vice may seem to be, that will make it small in the sight 
of God ; and so, while to outward view you are among 
the first, ye shall be ultimately among the last, for many 



110 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

that are first shall be last, and the last first." This 
phrase is repeated by the Lord at the end of the para- 
ble, with the addition of the words, " for many be called, 
but few are chosen." But the reference is not here to 
eternal election, for the word " chosen " is in this place 
employed much as we use the term " choice : " " many 
are called, but few are choice." The contrast thus is 
not between the elect and the non-elect, so called, but 
between two classes of real Christians, — the many 
average and commonplace believers who have still a 
large measure of the hireling spirit in them, and the 
few first-rate Christians who serve "all for love, and 
nothing for reward." Observe, Christ had said to the 
young man, "If thou wilt be perfect;" and the "chosen" 
here answers to the "perfect" there. Those are the 
princely and right royal disciples, who labor for love ; 
and in the end, though their service on earth may seem 
to be as small as the pouring of a vase of ointment on 
the Saviour's head, or the casting of two mites into the 
treasury, they shall be first ; while such as gave noble 
offerings, or did great achievements, if they did so in a 
spirit of pride or ostentation, or with the hope of gain- 
ing something thereby, will be last. 

This is the thought which the Saviour has, as I 
may say, dramatized in the parable of these vineyard 
laborers. For, see, those who were sent first into the 
enclosure to work made a special agreement with the 
householder. Mark the statement: "when he had 
agreed with the laborers for a penny a day." In the 
market-place they made a definite demand. There was 
the common colloquy in such a case. "What is the 
rate of wages this morning?" — "We will go for so 
much." — "I will give you only so much." — " Nay, we 
must have the sum we named, we cannot go for less," 



THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. Ill 

and so forth. It was a bargain, so much for so much. 
But it was not so with those who went at the third, 
sixth, ninth, and eleventh hours. They left their treat- 
ment entirely in the hands of the householder. They 
trusted in his generosity, and did not require any agree- 
ment. It was enough for them that he had said, 
" Whatsoever is right I will give you." They left it to 
himself; but the others would have a specified sum. 
They did their work in faith ; but the others, like Peter, 
pressed the question, " "What shall we have therefore ? " 
And this difference in the dispositions of the workers 
accounts entirely for the difference in their treatment 
by the householder. For, when the late comers pre- 
sented themselves, they were paid with a denarius — 
probably to their own surprise, since from another para- 
ble we learn that the rewards of the " choice " disciples 
will be astonishing to themselves. But they had trusted 
him, and he would be better to them than they expect- 
ed. When, however, the early laborers appeared, they 
thought that they were hardly used because they got 
only a denarius. " The others had received that: surely 
he was not going to put them on a level with those who 
had known neither the burden nor the heat of the day. 
If they who had been only an hour in the vineyard 
received a penny, manifestly those who had been there 
toiling for twelve hours should have twelve." — "But 
no," the householder replies: "you would have an agree- 
ment in the morning, and now you must be content 
with it in the evening. A bargain is a bargain. Since 
you held me to it before you began to work, I must 
hold you to it after you have ceased. My treatment of 
the others is nothing to you. I deal with my laborers 
as I find them. To the hireling I will show myself a 
hirer ; but to the trustful and confiding one who thinks 



112 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Less of reward for his work than of joy in the work, 
and leaves himself entirely in my hands. I will prove 
myself more than worthy of his confidence. Take, 
therefore, what is yours, and leave me to dispose of what 
is mine."' Thus interpreted, the parable is a striking 
confirmation of the Psalmist's words : " With the merci- 
ful thou wilt show thyself merciful: with an upright 
man thou wilt show thyself upright : with the pure thou 
wilt show thyself pure ; and with the fro ward thou wilt 
show thyself froward." 2 The parable is the represen- 
tation of the bargaining spirit, run to seed ; in contrast 
with the trustful spirit, lovingly rewarded. The bar- 
gainers get only that which they stipulated for: the 
confiding ones get far more than they would have 
thought of asking. The bargainers are filled with dis- 
satisfaction at the generosity with which the others 
were treated: the confiding ones are sent away with 
an exulting joy that they have been treated so well. 
The conduct of the first laborers represents what the 
spirit which Peter manifested would ultimately come 
to, if it were to obtain the upper hand : that of the 
others represents the outcome of the spirit of love and 
trust in the choice, first-rate. or. if you will, "perfect" 
Christians. The hireling spirit is selfish, unamiable. 
elder-brotherly, surly. The trustful spirit is humble, 
contented, happy, choice, and is itself a reward which 
is the forerunner of a great deal more. 

Such, as it seems to me. is the main lesson of this 
difficult parable. And if this be a correct view of the 
matter, we need not perplex ourselves with the ques- 
tion who those are that are represented by the laborers 
who began at nine, twelve, three, and five o'clock re- 

l Ps. xvni.iJo. 26. 



THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 113 

spectively. It makes little difference whether we under- 
stand the Jews to be the first, and the Gentiles to be 
the others, or whether we take the first to mean the 
apostles themselves, and the others to be those who 
should come into the kingdom at subsequent dates 
down through every after age. The pivot of the lesson 
is not in any particular interpretation of that sort. 
Nay, as one has admirably said, "The nature of the 
work in the vineyard, and its exhausting toil ; the un- 
wearied compassion of the lord of the vineyard, going 
out hour after hour to invite the unemployed, — these 
and all other details are but the feathers of the arrow, 
helping it to fly straight to its mark : but the point is, 
that those who were first hired were last paid and least 
paid; and this because the first hired entered on their 
work in a bargaining spirit, and merely for the sake 
of winning a calculated and stipulated remuneration ; 
whereas the late hired laborers did their work in faith, 
not knowing what they were to get, but sure that they 
would not get less than they deserved." l 

This, then, being the central thought of the parable, 
we are in a position, having obtained possession of that, 
to take note of two things which might otherwise elude 
our observation or produce a false impression on our 
minds. The first is the peculiarity of the expression, 
" many that are first shall be last, and the last shall be 
first." The parable teaches a change of place between 
the first and the last, yet not a change that shall be 
universal. All the first shall not be last, and all the 
last shall not be first. No, only many ; and that for a 
reason other than their being either first or last. They 
shall not be last simply because they were first, nor first 

1 The Parables as recorded by Matthew, by Marcus Dods, D.D., p. 156. 



Ill THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

simply because they were last. But, first in the magni- 
tude and extent of their work, they shall be last because 
of the spirit in which it was performed ; and last in the 
objective character of the thing done, they shall be 
first because of the subjective disposition of which their 
doing of it was the manifestation. Yet there will be first 
who shall remain first ; and last, who shall remain last. 
If the doers of great and splendid deeds did them in 
a loving and trustful spirit, these, being first, shall 
continue first; and if the doers of little and incon- 
spicuous matters did them in a hireling spirit, these, 
being last, shall remain last : for the Lord of the vine- 
yard looks throughout at the spirit rather than the 
work. 

. Again, this view of the parable will keep us from 
so far mistaking its teaching as to suppose that it 
approves or recommends late coming into the vineyard. 
The third, sixth, ninth, and eleventh hours here do not 
refer to different seasons of the same individual life, — 
as if he who had declined to come in youth should 
come at middle age ; and he who had refused in mid- 
dle age should come in life's afternoon; and he who 
had refused all through life should come in the decrepi- 
tude of old age, or at the very approach of death. So 
far as appears, none of those who were engaged at the 
the later hours were in the market-place at the earlier. 
The persons spoken to were different each time ; and 
those called at the eleventh hour, when asked, " Why 
stand ye here all the day idle ? " could truthfully reply, 
" Because no one hath hired us." It is a truth, that, no 
matter how late in life a sinner comes to Jesus, he will 
be accepted ; but that is not the truth taught here, and 
no one ought to presume on such a perversion of the 
parable as that which makes it mean that if he refuse to 



THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 115 

obey God's call in the morning, or at the third, sixth, 
or ninth hour, he may have an opportunity of obey- 
ing it at the eleventh, and may then come off as well 
as those who have been Christians all their lives. No, 
no ! each of these companies of laborers obeyed the first 
summons which they received, and you will be like 
them only if you do the same. The hours here are not 
the different seasons of the same one life, but rather 
the centuries of an era ; and the teaching of that part 
of the story may be, that we who live far down the ages, 
if we will but work for God in the apostolic spirit, in 
self-denial and self-sacrifice, from love and not from 
hire, shall receive an apostolic reward. The great ones 
of the Church were not exclusively among those called 
into it in the early stages of its history, and long service 
in the nineteenth century shall have an equal honor 
with martyrdom in the first. Or, more generally still, 
the meaning is, that it is not the time at which the 
service is rendered, or the length and magnitude of 
the service itself, that will determine the reward, but the 
spirit of the laborer. Stephen and James, cut off in 
the beginning of their activity, before they had well 
entered the vineyard, shall not lose on that account, 
but shall be side by side with Paul, who toiled on 
through forty years of suffering for Christ ; and with 
John, who lingered in Ephesus till he reached an age 
of more than a hundred years. The hireling spirit in 
any man, or in any age, will get simply and only its 
hire ; but the trustful disposition will always receive 
" far more exceeding abundantly " above its expecta- 
tion. 

The sum of the matter, then, is, that the motive gives 
its character to the work ; and as men cannot see the 
motive, but must judge only from the work, it follows 



116 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

that there will be at the last a " reversal of human judg- 
ments," since God estimates all by that which is invisi- 
ble to men, but which is naked and open to his sight. 
Many of those whom men have placed first shall then 
be found among the last; and many of those whom 
men have been wont to place among the lowest and the 
last, shall then be put among the highest and the first. 
That is the thought which Canon Mozley has elaborated 
and enforced in his great sermon on " The Reversal of 
Human Judgments," contained in his most suggestive 
volume of University Discourses. I call it a great ser- 
mon, not because it is strong either in rhetoric or illus- 
tration ; but because of the grasp with which it holds 
the reader of it to this one thought, and compels him, 
no matter in what department of God's vineyard he 
may be laboring, to analyze his own work and at the 
same time to examine his own heart, making the mo- 
tive the test of the life. An English critic says of the 
book as a whole, that there are some sermons in it, " the 
reading of which would be enough to change the whole 
character and life of a man ; " and that to which I refer 
is one of these. Indeed, for my own part, I am inclined 
to put it among the foremost of the sermons known to 
me, that have been published in this century ; for it 
clearly shows that very efficient work may be done, 
even in God's vineyard, by a man in whom there may 
be very little of the motive of true love to God inspir- 
ing the service. The church is composed, indeed, of 
those who have confessed Christ; but it is a society, 
existing for certain purposes, and, as such, it has its 
machinery for the carrying out of these purposes, like 
any other society that has been formed in the world. 
Now, the keeping of any part of that machinery in 
motion is in itself no more a spiritual work, than the 



THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 117 

carrying-on of any other machinery; and if it is not 
done with a spiritual motive, then, even though it be 
done for the church, it is not spiritual work such as 
God can value and reward. Thus, in a missionary 
society, the great object is spiritual ; but it has to be 
sustained and carried on like any other business soci- 
ety; its books have to be kept like those of any 
commercial firm, and he who keeps them is not in that 
doing a spiritual work, any more than a bookkeeper 
in a mercantile house is doing a spiritual work. The 
mercantile bookkeeper may make his work spiritual by 
doing it as unto the Lord ; but the missionary book- 
keeper will make his secular if he does it simply for his 
wages, and as wxuk. So, again, in the office of the min- 
istry, there is much in common with ordinary depart- 
ments of life. It gratifies literary tastes ; it affords 
opportunities for study ; it has associated with it a 
certain honor and esteem in the eyes of others ; it fur- 
nishes occasions for the thrill that every real orator feels 
in the delivery of a message to his fellow-men, and the 
like. Now, if a man is in the ministry simply for these 
kinds of enjoyment, there is no more spirituality in his 
work, than there is in that of the litterateur, or the politi- 
cal orator. Theirs may be spiritual, indeed, if they are 
doing it out of love to God ; but his must be merely 
secular if he does it only from such motives as have 
place in ordinary literature or eloquence. You see, then, 
how it conies, that in the estimation of men one may 
stand very high, may be, indeed, reputed among the first 
of vineyard laborers, and yet be placed among the lowest 
and the last by God. But I cannot put this thought 
with any thing like the force of Mozley ; and, therefore, 
I conclude my discourse with a paragraph from him 
which may whet your appetite to such a degree that 



US THE P ARABLES OF OUR 8AVIOUR. 

you will not rest until you have read the whole ser- 
mon : -The truth is, wherever there is action, effort, 
aim at certain objects and ends ; wherever the name of 
human energy mounts up. — all this may gather either 
round a centre of pure and unselfish desire, or round 
a centre of egotism ; and no superiority in the subject 
of the work can prevent the lapse into the inferior mo- 
tive. In the must different objects, this may be the 
same : it is a quality of the individual. Whatever he 
does, if there is a degeneracy in the temper of his mind, 
it all collects and gathers, by a false direction which it 
receives from the false centre of attraction, round him- 
self. The subject or cause which a man takes up makes 
no difference. The religious leader can feel alike with 
the political, and as strongly, this lower source of inspi- 
ration ; can be accompanied by this idolized representa- 
tion of self, this mirror in which he sees himself growing 
and expanding in life's area. Are the keen relish for 
success, the spirit which kindles at human praise and the 
gusts of triumph, the feelings which accompany action 
upon a theatre, guaranteed no place in a man. by his 
having religious zeal? These are parts of human na- 
ture : and it is not zeal, but something else, which puri- 
fies human nature. So far as religion only supplies 
a man of keen earthly susceptibilities, and desire of a 
place in the world, with a subject, or an arena, so far 
that man stands on the same ground with a politician 
who is stimulated by this aim. They are the same 
identical type of men in different spheres. There is a 
conventional difference between them, but there is one 
moral heading. Both may be doing valuable work, im- 
portant service, in a public sense ; but if you do not 
think the politician a spiritual man because he is a use- 
ful man, no more must you think the active man in a 



THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD. 119 

religious sphere to be so. Spirituality belongs to the mo- 
tive." 1 

Now, that will help us to understand how it may- 
come, that one may have a high reputation among men 
for religious work, and yet be among the last when God 
pronounces the verdict ; for he sees, what men cannot 
see, the motive from which the whole activity has 
sprung, and tests it all by that. It is a solemn thought, 
and may well send us to examine ourselves. What are 
we in God's vineyard, — hirelings, or trusting, humble 
laborers, working for the love of Christ ? They that 
work for reward do not get as much as they want : 
they that work for love get far more than they expect. 
And the moment we ask of Christ, " What shall we 
have therefore ? " we vitiate the quality of our service. 
It is the same paradox which we have in the words, 
" He that hndeth his life shall lose it, but he that loseth 
his life for my sake shall find it." He that seeketh 
happiness for its own sake shall never get it ; but unto 
him that serveth God for love, happiness shall be added, 
and shall be itself a rich reward. 

Beautiful exceedingly in this connection is the story, 
— mythical, no doubt, in form, bat probably true in 
substance, — that is told concerning Thomas Aquinas. 
Worshipping one day in the chapel in which he was 
accustomed to perform his devotions, it is said that the 
Saviour thus addressed him : " Thomas, thou hast writ- 
ten much and well concerning me. What reward shall 
I give thee for thy work ? " Whereupon he answered, 
" Nihil nisi te, Domine^ — " Nothing but thyself, O 
Lord ! " And in very deed he is himself the best of 
all his gifts. He is himself the "exceeding great re- 

1 Mozley's University Sermons, pp. 80, 81. 



120 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

ward " of all his people. Let the spirit of the Angelic 
Doctor, as enshrined in this simple story, fill our hearts, 
and there will be no room within us for the hireling's 
selfishness. 



TUE TWO SONS. 121 



VIII. 

THE TWO SONS. 

(Matt. xxi. 28-32.) 

The meaning of this parable is determined for us by 
the occasion which called it forth. Questioned by the 
chief priests and elders of the people, as to the nature 
and source of the authority which he claimed, our Lord 
replied by promising to give them a definite answer 
when they should tell him whether the baptism of John 
was from heaven or of men. This placed them between 
the horns of a dilemma: for they knew that if they 
should say it was of men, they would provoke the an- 
tagonism of the people, who held John as a prophet ; 
and that, if they should say it was from heaven, Jesus 
would be ready with the retort, "Why then did ye 
not believe him?" They endeavored, therefore, to 
evade both alternatives by alleging that they could not 
tell whence it was ; and this reply of theirs, which was 
an evident subterfuge, evoked the parable which forms 
our theme at this time. 

Putting before them a hypothetical case, he ques- 
tioned them as to the conduct of the parties whom he 
described in it ; and then, turning their answer upon 
themselves, he virtually condemned them out of their 
own mouths. The story in some of its features is not 
unlike that which we had before us in our last dis- 
course. Here, too, we have the proprietor of a vine- 



122 THE PARABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

yard. But it was not so large, and he was not so 
wealthy, as in the former instance. He was a small 
freeholder, not able and not requiring to hire laborers, 
but dependent entirely on the services of his sons. Ac- 
cordingly, coming upon one of these in the morning, he 
said to him, " Son, go work to-day in my vineyard ; " but 
was met with the rude and undutiful reply, " I go not." 
This answer must have deeply wounded the father's 
heart ; but he said nothing, and, on coming to his other 
son, he repeated the command to him ; who replied with 
seeming alacrity, " I go, sir," or, as it is simply in the 
original, " I, sir," — as if the youth had said, " You may 
thoroughly depend on me." But, alas ! his eagerness 
was only in appearance ; for he never looked near the 
vineyard, and went his way after his own enjoyment. 
Meanwhile, however, the other son, struck, perhaps, 
with the effect which his disobedience had produced on 
his parent, thought better of it, and went into the vine- 
yard, and did the work which he had been requested to 
perform. Now, asks the Saviour at his priestly ques- 
tioners, " which of these two did the will of his father ? " 
And, apparently without any perception of the ref- 
erence of the story to themselves, they replied, "The 
first;" wherupon he rejoined, "Verily I say unto you, 
that the publicans and the harlots go into the kingdom 
of God before you : for John came unto you in the way 
of righteousness," — that is, preaching righteousness, 
— " and ye believed him not, but the publicans and 
the harlots believed him ; and ye, when ye had seen it, 
repented not afterward, that ye might believe him." 

Now, this direct utterance points the moral of the 
parable, and furnishes the key to its interpretation. 
The father is God ; the vineyard is the church. The 
sons are two classes of men to whom the command to 



THE TWO SONS. 123 

labor in the church comes from God : the first is the 
type of openly abandoned and regardless sinners, who 
on receiving the command of God defiantly refuse obe- 
dience, but afterward, on sober second thought, repent 
and become earnest in working the work of God ; the 
second is the representative of the hypocrites who in 
smooth and polite phrase make promises which they 
never intend to keep, and who, never changing their 
mind, take no further thought either of God or of his 
service. 

In the primary intention of our Lord, the particu- 
lar sons to whom the father gave his command were 
the Jews, to whom " at sundry times and in divers man- 
ners" he had spoken through the prophets, and who 
in the Saviour's own day had the entire Old Testament 
in their hands. But the great majority among them 
disregarded his words. Some openly set them at 
defiance : others, professing in their language a high 
regard for them, utterly ignored them in their con- 
duct. Such was, in the main, the state of things among 
them when John the Baptist came preaching repentance 
and the coming of the kingdom of heaven : and the 
result of his labors was, that many of the flagrantly 
immoral were awakened, and became subjects of the 
kingdom ; while few of the Pharisees, chief priests, or 
elders were brought to repentance through his appeals. 
The former were like the first son, who did not stub- 
bornly continue in his disobedience, but after a season 
returned to his filial devotion and duty : the latter were 
like the second son, who said, and did not, and persisted 
in their inconsistency. 

But while the special inference drawn from this para- 
ble by the Lord pointed its application to those whom 



124 THE PAP ABLE S OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

he was at the moment addressing, there are beneath his 
words great general principles of permanent importance, 
which ought to be seriously pondered by every hearer 
of the gospel. They clearly delineate two classes of 
characters, which are to be met with in all generations, 
and of which the publicans and harlots on the one 
hand, and the Pharisees and chief priests on the other, 
were only individual specimens. But as parables of this 
sort, which set before us only one aspect of important 
truth, are exceedingly apt to be perverted by being in- 
terpreted as if they illustrated the whole truth, it may 
help to preserve us from error, if we distinctly define 
the limits within which its explanation must be kept. 

Observe, then, in the first place, that the Lord does 
not express approval, and did not intend to approve, of 
the conduct of the first son, in every respect. When the 
father's command was given to him, he answered in 
the bluntest and most unqualified way, " I will not." 
There was no hypocrisy about him. He perhaps plumed 
himself on being an honest, outspoken fellow, who 
always said what he thought, and who hated to seem to 
be what he was not. Still, with all his frankness, he was 
disobedient; and we cannot suppose that the Saviour 
sanctioned that. This son is approved, not because he 
said "I will not," but because he repented of having 
said that, and proved the sincerity of his penitence by 
doing that which he had at first refused to do. There- 
fore, let no man suppose that it was in any way credit- 
able to this son, that he said, "I will not." I am the 
more particular in insisting upon this, which may seem 
to some of you a mere truism, because there are many, 
even in our own times, who appear to think that the 
very open frankness of their iniquity is a virtue. From 
their mode of speech you might imagine that they be- 



THE TWO SONS. 125 

lieve they will be forgiven for being sinners, simply 
because they have never pretended to be saints. Just 
as sometimes, after a man has insulted yon in the most 
blatant manner, he will speak as if he thought he was 
making a merit of his rudeness by saying, " I never go 
beating about the bush, I always say right out what I 
mean ; I am none of your fawning flatterers, and if I have 
any thing against another T tell it to him straight ; " so 
you will occasionally meet with one who appears to 
think that his sin ceases to be sin, because it is com- 
mitted openly and without any profession of religion. 
"As forme," he says, "I make no pretence. What I 
seem to be, I am. Nobody can condemn me for being a 
hypocrite." And so, because he is not a hypocrite, he 
tries to make himself believe that he is not a sinner 
at all. Now, mark the fallacy that lies at the root of 
this delusion. The man supposes that it is only the 
making of an affirmative answer to God's commands, 
that involves the obligation to serve God. But is it 
really so ? Am I not bound to honor Jehovah, and 
obey his commands, whether I make a promise to that 
effect or not? Does not the very making of such a 
promise spring out of the obligation that is felt prior to 
the making of it? God has a claim upon my service as 
my Creator, my Father, my Redeemer through Jesus 
Christ ; and the very first question that faces me as a 
moral agent is this: "Will you acknowledge that claim, 
and serve Jehovah, or will you not ? " If I will not, 
then my repudiation of it is not the less sinful because 
it is expressed openly, bluntly, and defiantly. Is a man 
any the less God's enemy because he is outspoken in 
his declaration of that fact? I grant, indeed, that, as 
between such a one and the hypocrite, the hypocrite is 
the more guilty of the two ; but the greater guilt of 



126 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

hypocrisy must not blind the eyes of the abandoned 
man to the real and awful wickedness of his open 
iniquity. 

Let it be noted, in the second place, that our Saviour 
does not approve of this son's conduct as a whole, as 
if it were the only good and proper way of meeting 
God's command, or as if there would be no danger 
in our trying to do all through exactly as he did. 
This man first disobeyed, then repented, and then 
obeyed. But because that is the only course which is 
here contrasted with that of the hypocrite, it does not 
follow that there is not a third which is better than 
either. It was well that this son repented; but it 
would have been better that he had never refused, but 
had gone right off to the vineyard, and joyfully com- 
menced his work. It is needful to put this very plainly, 
because many, especially among the young, seem to set 
the conduct of this son before them in its entirety as 
the pattern which they mean to imitate. They think 
that they, too, will refuse for a while, promising to 
themselves that by and by they will repent ; and their 
views are strengthened by many senseless and utterly 
immoral sayings current among men, such as these: 
" Let him sow his wild oats, and he will sober down 
by and by;" "Youth must have its fling," and the like. 
But while we are warranted to cherish the hope regard- 
ing such careless and abandoned sinners, that they may 
yet repent, and while we are commanded to labor and 
to pray with the view of bringing them to repentance, 
it would be an awfully perilous thing for any one to 
say deliberately, " I will do just as this son did. Twill 
take my own 'pleasure for a while, and then, when I've had 
my satisfaction, I will repent and do as G-od requires." 
In the case of this youth, there was no forelook to later 



THE TWO SONS. 127 

repentance, when the answer was first given. He spoke 
for the moment merely; and there was, therefore, the 
greater hope that he would ultimately bethink himself, 
and turn from his evil way. But in the other case 
there is a deliberate counting on the future ; a wilful 
putting of the soul into present danger, and a com- 
pounding for that by the promise to itself of future 
repentance : and these, when taken together, amount to 
a " tempting " of the Holy Spirit which is dangerously 
near the sin against the Holy Ghost. I know of no 
peril more deadly than that; and just because of the 
commonness of the sayings to which I have referred, 
I would all the more emphatically warn you, my young 
friends, of its insidiousness. Have nothing to do with 
" ivild oats " in any shape. You cannot dissever the 
present from the future ; and in the moral world, as in 
the natural, you shall reap what you sow, ivith an in- 
crease. If you sow to the flesh, you will reap corrup- 
tion, which is flesh in its most loathsome condition ; if 
you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind, which is 
the wind in its most destructive violence; yea, even 
although, like the first of these two sons, you should 
afterward repent, you may depend upon it that God 
will make you, in one form or another, to " possess the 
sins of your youth." In the sorrowful remembrance of 
the wasted past ; in the deep and saddening conviction 
that many precious opportunities have been irrecover- 
ably lost ; or in the consequences, mental, moral, or 
physical, which your early follies will leave upon you, 
God will make you to possess the sins of your youth. 
But you may never repent. You may never have the 
opportunity to do so ; or, if you have, you may not 
have the disposition to improve it, for sin may have 
weakened your resolution, and taken your will captive. 



128 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Therefore let me urge you to give prompt, present, 
sincere obedience to Jehovah's call. 

But looking now at the other son, I ask you to ob- 
serve, in the third place, that our Lord does not design 
to condemn the making of a promise to God, when that 
is done sincerely and performed earnestly. This second 
son was not blamed because he said promptly, and ap- 
parently also cheerfully, " I go, sir" but because he did 
not mean what he said. His purpose was to get for the 
moment the approval of his father, and at the same time 
to take his own way and enjoy his own pleasure. He 
represents the hypocrite, who seeks by a fair profession 
to combine the services of God and mammon. But be- 
cause he is condemned for his hypocrisy, we must not 
suppose that it is wrong to confess that we are God's 
servants, provided ive do that sincerely. Has not the 
Lord Jesus in many passages spoken of the duty of con- 
fessing him before men ? and does not Paul in a well- 
known passage declare that " if we shall confess with 
our mouths the Lord Jesus, and shall believe in our 
hearts that God hath raised him from the dead, we shall 
be saved " ? l It cannot be, therefore, that any thing in 
this parable should discourage the making of such a 
confession. What is here condemned is the making of 
it insincerely, — the saying of one thing by the lips, and 
of another thing in the heart and by the life. We 
should see to it, when we confess Christ, that we are 
acting a truthful part ; but if we really love him, it is 
our duty and our privilege to confess him, and we shall 
find that strength and fellowship and happiness come 
to us in the wake of our doing so. 

1 Horn. x. 9. 



THE TWO SONS. 129 

But now, turning from the limits within which our in- 
terpretation of this parable must be kept, let us proceed 
to the consideration of those truths which, within these 
limits, it may be fairly regarded as-enforcing. 

I. And here, first, I mention the nature of the de- 
mand which God makes on every one to whom the gos- 
pel comes. " Go work to-day in my vineyard." Mark 
how practical true religion is : " G-o, work." The test 
of sincerity is not in words, but in deeds ; not in knowl- 
edge, but in the acting-out of our knowledge ; not in 
profession, but in practice. The question of the Sav- 
iour to his followers is not, " What say ye more than 
others ? " but, " What do ye more than others ? " and 
on another occasion he speaks after this fashion : " If 
ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them." 
Words are valuable only in so far as they are the truth- 
ful expression of an inward spirit, which will prompt 
also to appropriate deeds; and we can prove that we 
love God, only by serving him. Speech may be decep- 
tive ; indeed, a noted diplomat once said that the chief 
purpose of language is to conceal thought: but the 
habitual bent of the life is always a genuine index of 
the character. By works, then, we make manifest that 
we are the children of God. Observe, however, the ex- 
pression which I have used. Works are the manifesta- 
tion of our love to God, not the means of procuring his 
love for us. We labor, not to get God to love us, but 
because we already love him ; and we love him because 
he first loved us. Or, to put it in another way : works 
are the indications that we possess true spiritual life, 
not the means of our becoming alive. We labor be- 
cause we live, and not that we may be made alive. 

Mark, again, the peculiar nature of the work by which 



130 TIIE P 'ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

our love and life are to be manifested. " Go, work in 
my vineyard" Matthew Henry has said here very 
quaintly, " By the sin of Adam we were turned out to 
work upon the common, and to eat the herb of the 
field ; but by the grace of our Lord Jesus we are called 
again to work in the vineyard." This labor consists in 
working out our own salvation, and building up our 
own character, according to the plan furnished by the 
Apostle Peter when he says, " Add to your faith vir- 
tue, and to virtue knowledge, and to knowledge tem- 
perance, and to temperance patience, and to patience 
godliness, and to godliness brotherly kindness, and to 
brotherly kindness charity." 1 Or, in another view, this 
labor is the cultivation to the fullest extent of that 
cluster of grapes which is the proper fruit of the true 
vine, and which Paul has thus enumerated : " love, joy, 
peace, long-suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meek- 
ness, temperance." 2 Nor is this all ; for it is also real 
vineyard work to labor for the extension of the vine- 
yard itself, by the diffusion of the gospel among those 
who know it not. By such works of faith, and labors 
of love, and patience of hope, we are to show that we 
are indeed the sons of God. 

Mark, again, the promptitude of the obedience which 
is here, required: " Go work to-day" "Now is the ac- 
cepted time. 7 ' There are only two passages, so far as I 
remember, in all the Scriptures, that refer to "to-mor- 
row ; " and they are these : " Boast not thyself of 
to-morrow, for thou knowest not what a day may bring 
forth." "Be not anxious for the morrow, for the 
morrow shall have anxiety enough for the things of 
itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof." 
And, though the meaning of each is distinct from that 

i 2 Pet. i. 5, 6, 7. 2 Gal. v. 22, 23. 



THE TWO SONS. 13 1 

of the other, jet they both agree in emphasizing the 
importance of to-day. By the work of the present, 
more than by the promises which we make for the 
future, do we make manifest what we are as in the 
sight of God ; and if, when he says " to-day," we reply 
" to-morroiv," then we are as really guilty of disobeying 
him, as if we had used the words of this son in the 
parable, and flatly answered, "I will not." Beloved, 
let us be faithful with ourselves here, and see if we are 
not involved in this condemnation. Are there not 
many among us who would shrink from saying to the 
Lord, " I will not," while yet we are habitually post- 
poning the performance of duty, and are daily increas- 
ing our arrears of service to him ? "Which of us will 
dare to say that yesterday, for example, he left nothing 
undone of all that God in his providence put before him 
to be performed on his behalf ? Let us be on our guard, 
therefore, in this matter ; for procrastination grows upon 
us the more we yield to it. Our work accumulates, and 
our time for doing it diminishes, all because we are not 
fully alive to the importance of to-day. " To-morrow," 
says the proverb, " is the day on which idle men work, 
and fools reform." Let us show our industry by begin- 
ning to work for God now, and our wisdom by reform- 
ing at once, for still the command runs, " Go work 
to-day ;" and evermore, as we waver in our obedience 
thereto, the Holy Ghost repeats the warning, " To-day, 
if ye ivill hear his voice, harden not your hearts." 

Finally, here mark the tender nature of the appeal 
which God makes to every man in this command: "Son, 
go ivork ! " Son f Yes ; for God is our Father. He 
has a father's right to our affection and obedience, espe- 
cially if we confess that he has redeemed us from sin 
and ruin by the blood of Christ. True, we read of his 



132 THE r ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

having introduced us into " the glorious liberty of the 
children of God." But there is here no contradiction, 
for the true-hearted son delights to do his father's will, 
and in his estimation that service is perfect freedom. 
He accounts no sacrifice too great to be made, and no 
toil too severe to be undergone, in his service ; and all 
this does not cease to keep hold of him when he comes 
to the discovery that God is his Father. His first utter- 
ance thereupon, like that of his Lord, is, " Wist ye not 
that I must be about my Father's business ? " And 
still, as men seek to beguile him from his purpose, his 
reply is, "I must work the works of him that sent me, 
while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can 
work." Sonship is not incompatible with service. It 
only transmutes that service into jo}^. The heir-apparent 
to the British crown has for his motto the words, Ich 
dien, " I serve ; " and only as he acts up to that noble 
ideal, will he prove himself worthy of the throne which 
he is one day to fill. Nay, higher yet, it is written of 
the Son of God, that, " though he were a Son, yet learned 
he obedience by the things which he suffered." So far, 
therefore, from being incompatible with sonship, serv- 
ice is its most loving expression ; and we shall prove 
ourselves enemies and aliens if we refuse to render it. 
This is an unerring test by which we may determine 
whether or not we are the children of God ; and it is 
important that we apply it faithfully, for only as we 
stand that test, shall we enjoy the fulfilment of the 
precious promise, " They shall be mine, saith the Lord, 
in the day when I make up my jewels ; and I will spare 
them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him." 

IT. But a second thing brought out in this parable is 
the danger connected with the making of an insincere 



THE TWO SONS. 133 

confession of God. To the chief priests and elders 
the Saviour said, " The publicans and harlots go into the 
kingdom before you." He did not allege that it was 
impossible for them to enter it, or that their conversion 
was an utterly hopeless thing ; but he gave them to 
understand that the difficulties in their way were greater 
than those which had to be encountered by the openly 
abandoned. Now, it is important to define the nature 
of these difficulties. They were not, to use a conven- 
ient though somewhat cumbrous phraseology, objective, 
or lying outside of themselves ; but subjective, in the 
state of their own hearts. Outside of the soul of any 
sinner, there are no obstacles in the way of his salvation. 
But the particular condition of each sinner's heart 
determines for him the particular difficulties with which 
he has to contend in entering the kingdom by submit- 
ting himself to Christ; and what the Saviour here 
means to say is, that such difficulties are greater in the 
case of one who has made an insincere confession of 
submission to God than in that of open and abandoned 
transgressors. The state of soul produced by that in- 
sincerity makes it harder for him to enter the kingdom 
than it is for the publicans and the harlots to repent of 
their iniquities. For he is satisfied with himself; while 
they, for the most part, are filled with loathing of them- 
selves. He thinks that he has done well because he has 
said, " I go, sir : " they know they have done ill because 
the} T have said so flagrantly, " I go not." He has de- 
luded himself with the belief that he has done all that 
is required, when he has simply promised that he will do 
it, as many a man cheats himself with the notion that 
he has paid his debt when he has only given his bill 
for the amount : they are conscious that they have not 
only done nothing in the way of serving God, but that 



134 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

they have also committed grievous wickedness against 
him. Thus it comes, that when appeals to repentance 
are made by some faithful preacher, such as John the 
Baptist, to both alike, he complacently puts them from 
him, as not meant for him, because he has promised to 
do as God commands ; while they are stirred up to cry, 
"What must we do to be saved?" and they give 
themselves no rest until they have returned unto the 
Lord. Self-righteousness is thus a greater obstacle to 
one's entering the kingdom than sinful indulgence, and 
there is more hope of the conversion of a great sinner 
than there is of that of a great Pharisee ; or, in other 
words, it is a harder matter to get rid of righteous self 
than of sinful self. 

Bat over and above that feeling of self-complacency 
which is produced by insincerity, we must not forget to 
mention that there is also a hardening influence connected 
with it, which tends to make the heart less receptive of 
the truth. It blunts the conscience ; it dims the moral 
perceptions ; it weakens the will ; it paralyzes the ener- 
gies. Indeed, we may say that there is perhaps no habit 
more subversive of all the nobler principles of our 
nature than that of continually saying, "I go, sir," 
without going after all. Still, let us be thankful that 
the salvation of such as are guilty of this habitual in- 
sincerity is not an utter impossibility. They may yet 
enter the kingdom if they will repent; and if, in de- 
scribing the character of this second son in the parable, 
I have held up a mirror in which any one of you has 
seen himself, let such an one realize at once the danger 
of his position, and cry earnestly unto the Lord in 
David's prayer, " Unite my heart, and I will run in the 
way of thy commandments. I will praise thee, O Lord, 
with my whole heart." 



THE TWO SONS. 135 

III. But in this parable it is very clear, in the third 
place, that the Saviour meant to encourage sinners, even 
of the vilest description, to repent, and believe the gos- 
pel. " The publicans and harlots enter the kingdom : " 
there is, therefore, salvation for the chief of sinners. 
No guilt is too great to be washed away by the blood 
of Christ. No heart is too bad to be renewed by the 
Holy Spirit. Listen to these words : " Come now, and 
let us reason together, saith the Lord. Though your 
sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow: 
though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." 
" He is able to save to the uttermost all that come unto 
God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession 
for them ; " and to the penitent thief who hung by his 
side the Lord Jesus said, " To-day shalt thou be with 
me in paradise." Therefore let no sinner despair. 
But, on the other hand, let no sinner presume or ima- 
gine, that, because it is said here that the publicans and 
harlots went into the kingdom before the chief priests 
and elders, therefore open sinners may be saved with-' 
out repentance. This first son repented of his disobe- 
dience ; and so it is only when a sinner repents, that 
he is forgiven and accepted. Very close is the relation 
which God has established between a sinner's turning 
from sin and receiving pardon. Take that matchless 
promise in the first chapter of the prophecies of Isaiah, 
which I have but now repeated, and in what connection 
do you find it ? Here is the context : " Wash you ; 
make you clean ; put away the evil of your doing from 
before mine eyes ; cease to do evil ; learn to do well ; 
seek judgment ; relieve the oppressed ; judge the fath- 
erless ; plead for the widow. Come now, and let us 
reason together." In the same way we have elsewhere 
in Isaiah this injunction : " Let the wicked forsake his 



136 THE PAEABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

way. and the unrighteous man his thoughts ; and let 
him return unto the Lord, and he will have mercy upon 
him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon." 
So, too, the apostles everywhere preached repentance in 
connection with the remission of sins. If, therefore, 
we would be faithful, we must declare that there is 
salvation for the guiltiest and the vilest, if they will 
repent, and return to God through Jesus Christ. Not 
that their repentance deserves the pardon, but that 
there can be no pardon without repentance. Jesus 
Christ will save no man in his sins ; but he will save 
any penitent, no matter how openly immoral he may 
have been, from his sins. Anew, therefore, I repeat 
the glad refrain of Peter's pentecostal sermon, " Eepent 
and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus 
Christ, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive 
the gift of the Holy Ghost." And what is it to re- 
pent? Let Bishop Wilberforce make answer: "It is 
to take the first turn to the right." 



THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 137 



IX. 

THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 

(Matt. xxi. 33-44. J 

This parable, following close on that which we con- 
sidered in our last discourse, deals with the same general 
subject ; but it carries it to a higher application, and 
gives it a wider scope. The parable of the two sons 
exposes the treatment given by the chief priests and 
elders to John the Baptist ; this of the wicked husband- 
men holds up to view the rejection of Jesus himself by 
the Jewish people as a whole, and utters a solemn warn- 
ing of the consequences that would ensue therefrom. 
The story is at once very simple and very sad. A 
wealthy householder, before setting out for a long ab- 
sence from home, marked off a large space of ground 
suitable for a vineyard, planted it with vines, enclosed 
it with a hedge or a wall to keep out animals and ma- 
rauders, digged in it a wine-press, or more properly a 
wine-fat, into which the juice of the grapes might flow, 
and built in it a tower for the accommodation of the 
watchers and laborers generally. 1 He did every thing, 
in short, that was necessary to make it a well-appointed 
vineyard, sparing neither labor nor expense to furnish 
it with the best in each department of cultivation. 
Having done all this, he let it out to husbandmen on 
certain stipulated terms. They were to have the full 

1 See Edersheim's Life and Times of Jesus the Christ, vol. ii. p. 422. 



138 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

management of the vineyard, and lie was to have a 
rental of some sort for their use of his property. 
Among the Jews, as Edersheim l tells ns, "there were 
three modes of dealing with land. According to one 
of these, the laborers emplo}*ed received a certain por- 
tion of the fruits, say a third or a fourth of the produce. 
In such cases it seems, at least sometimes, to have been 
the practice, besides giving them a portion of the prod- 
uce, to provide also the seed (if it was a field), and to 
pay wages to the laborers. The other two modes of 
letting land were, either that the tenant paid a money 
rent to the proprietor, or else that he agreed to give the 
owner a definite amount of produce, whether the har- 
vest had been good or bad." He adds, M There can 
scarcely be a doubt that it is the latter kind of lease 
which is referred to in the parable, the lessees being 
bound to give the owner a certain amount of fruits in 
their season." 

After making such, an arrangement, the owner went 
into a far country, much as one here might go to 
Europe for a long residence there ; and while there he 
sent accredited agents, here called his servants, that they 
might receive in his behalf the stipulated portion of 
fruits. But the husbandmen had no intention of giv- 
ing him any thing ; and they cruelly maltreated his 
messengers, beating one, stoning another, and killing 
another. One would have thought that this would have 
provoked the proprietor to retaliate ; but he simply sent 
other messengers of higher rank and greater importance 
than the former. These, however, were only similarly 
abused; and then, as a last resource, the householder 
said, " They will reverence my son." So he sent " his 
one son, his well beloved," as Mark has it : but his 

1 See Edersheim's Life and Times of Jesus the Christ, vol. ii. p. 123. 



THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 139 

appearance only stirred the laborers to greater fury, for 
they said one to another, " This is the heir ; come, let 
us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance." " The 
owner is away," — as if they had exclaimed, — " he will 
never come back ; if we kill his heir, there will be no 
one to dispute our claim to the property : therefore let 
us slay him, and take possession." So " they caught 
him, and cast him out of the vineyard, and slew him." 

So far the story. Now turning to his hearers, the 
Lord asked, "When the lord, therefore, of the vine- 
yard cometh, what will he do unto those husband- 
men?" And they, apparently unconscious that they 
were pronouncing their own doom, replied, " He will 
miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out 
his vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall ren- 
der him the fruits in their seasons." To this answer 
the Lord Jesus responded by making application to 
himself and them of a well-known passage in the Book 
of Psalms, and uttering a warning regarding the dan- 
ger and destruction of those who persistently and 
defiantly rejected him. But we shall leave the consid- 
eration of these until we have settled the meaning of 
the parable to which they are appended. 

The householder very clearly here, like the father in 
the former parable, is God. But what is the vineyard? 
A common answer is that it represents the Jewish 
Church, and there is no doubt that in Isaiah's beautiful 
allegory "the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the 
house of Israel." So, again, the vine of the eightieth 
Psalm is the Jewish Church which was brought out of 
Egypt and planted in the Holy Land. And we cannot 
forget that the Lord Jesus himself represents the union 
between himself and his Church under this figure : " I 
am the vine, ye are the branches." But it is clear to 



140 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

me, in spite of all these analogies, that in this parable 
the vineyard with its appurtenances and belongings 
does not stand for the people at all. It rather signifies 
the special advantages and opportunities which were 
given to the people as the chosen seed, and in virtue of 
God's covenant with them. It would be running the 
parable into the ground, and allowing fancy to guide 
where reason alone should rule, if we were to under- 
take to say what is meant especially by the hedge, and 
what by the wine-fat, and what by the tower. We 
prefer, therefore, to content ourselves with the general 
assertion that the vineyard, with all in it, represents the 
theocratic privileges enjoyed by the Jewish nation under 
the Mosaic institute, the blessings which were peculiar 
to them above all other peoples on the face of the earth, 
and which came to them as the children of God's 
covenant. 

Now, for these blessings they had to give a certain 
return. Privilege entails responsibility. The more one 
receives, the more he must account for. They who had 
enjoyed so many more favors at the hand of God than 
other nations, ought to have been just so much better 
than other nations, and ought to have cheerfully ren- 
dered to him the service which he sought. Holy lives, 
loving service, cheerful and devoted loyalty to him- 
self, — these were the fruits God sought as the return 
for the giving of the theocracy and its blessings to 
them. Now, this interpretation of the vinej^ard as de- 
noting the covenant advantages of the Jews, or what 
the Lord in the forty-third verse calls " the kingdom 
of God," as enjoyed by the Israelites, leads to the 
identification of the husbandmen with the Jewish peo- 
ple as a whole. Some have tried to restrict the ref- 
erence of the husbandmen to the rulers and teachers 



THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 141 

among the Jews ; but it was not from them alone that 
the kingdom was taken. It was from the Jewish nation 
as such ; and therefore the nation as a whole, and not 
merely any one class in it, must here be symbolized by 
the husbandmen. But if that be so, it becomes easy to 
explain who the servants that were sent to claim the 
fruits for the householder represent ; for, in this view 
of the parable, they stand for the prophets who came 
in Jehovah's name, at different stages in the history of 
Israel, and of whom many were grievously entreated at 
the hands of the people. Nor is it difficult to discover 
what, in this aspect of the case, is suggested by the 
removal of the householder from the vicinity of the vine- 
yard into a far country ; for, while it is true that God is 
everywhere present, it is also true that Jehovah in the 
early history of the Hebrew tribes was more conspicu- 
ously with and among them than he was at any subse- 
quent stage of their national career. As Trench has 
finely said, "At Sinai, when the theocratic constitu- 
tion was founded, and in the miracles which accom- 
panied the deliverance from Egypt and the bringing 
into Canaan, the Lord may be said to have openly mani- 
fested himself to Israel, but then to have withdrawn 
himself for a while, not speaking again to the people 
face to face, but waiting in patience to see what the 
law would effect, and what manner of works the people 
would bring forth." * Or, as Goebel has expressed it, 
"He withdrew into expectant passivity, leaving room 
for the spontaneous development of the nation on the 
soil of the theocracy and under the influence of its 
institutions." 2 

But the result, as indicated by their treatment of 

1 Notes on the Parables, p. 197. 

2 Goebel's Parables of Jesus, p. 342. 



142 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

his commissioned servants, was that they ungratefully 
rebelled against him. In the days of Elijah, Jezebel 
cut off the prophets of the Lord, and Ahab subjected 
Micaiah to the foulest indignity. In the reign of Joash, 
the people conspired against Zechariah the son of 
Jehoiada, on whom the Spirit of God came ; and they 
stoned him with stones. Jeremiah was cruelly abused 
by those to whom he went as the messenger of the 
Lord; and the tradition has always been, that Isaiah 
was sawn asunder by the order of Manasseh. Thus 
the account given in the parable of the treatment of 
the servants by the husbandmen was literally true 
of the reception given by the Jewish nation to the 
prophets : " they beat one, and stoned another, and 
killed another." Last of all came the Son of God in 
the person of Jesus Christ, and him they crucified. 
There is thus a clear reference to himself in this part 
of the parable ; and thereby the Lord at once indicates 
his knowledge of the designs of his enemies, and uses 
means if possible to bring them to a better mind. The 
words were spoken just two days after the triumphal 
entry into Jerusalem, and on the Tuesday of the cruci- 
fixion week : so we may be sure that they went right to 
the hearts of those who were already conspiring to bring 
about his death ; and that enables us to understand how 
it came, that when, according to Luke, Jesus himself 
declared what the householder would do, in these words : 
" He shall come and destroy these husbandmen, and 
shall give the vineyard to others," they cried out in dis- 
may, " God forbid ! " They got just then a momentary 
sight of him and of themselves ; but, alas ! they deliber- 
ately closed their eyes again, and went defiantly on in 
the course that led to ruin both national and in dividual. 
Here, then, is the interpretation of the parable : The 



THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 143 

householder is God ; the vineyard is the theocratic privi- 
leges enjoyed by those who were the chosen people of 
God, and as such were placed by him under the law 
of Moses ; the husbandmen are the Jews themselves ; 
the removal of the householder into a far country is 
the withdrawal of God from such open manifestation 
of himself as he made on Sinai, into " expectant passiv- 
ity," waiting for the result to develop itself freely in 
the choice of the people themselves ; the servants sent 
were the prophets, who were often cruelly maltreated 
by those to whom they were commissioned ; the son is 
the Lord Jesus himself, the crucifixion of whom was the 
climax of the nation's iniquity, for which the kingdom 
of God was taken from it, and given to the Gentiles. 

Now, with this key in our hands we shall be the 
better able to unlock the meaning of the solemn utter- 
ances which the Lord Jesus added to this probing par- 
able. They are three. The first is a quotation from 
the hundred and eighteenth Psalm, which he very evi- 
dently appropriates to himself. If you look back to the 
beginning of the chapter, you will find there the ac- 
count of his entrance in triumph into the temple, and 
of the offence which the chief priests and scribes took 
at the song of the children on that memorable occasion. 
Read verse 15: "And when the chief priests and the 
scribes saw the wonderful things that he did, and the 
children crying in the temple, and saying, Hosanna 
to the Son of David, they were sore displeased, and 
said unto him, Hearest thou what these say ? And 
Jesus saith unto them, Yea : have ye never read, Out of 
the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected 
praise ? " Now, the remarkable thing is, that from the 
same Psalm out of which the children took their song, 
the Lord extracts these words of reproof; as if he 



144 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

would say to them, " The children's instinct was cor- 
rect when they greeted me with their joyful hosannas 
as the Son of David. I may not look like the Messiah 
now, but recall the words of that same ode in which 
they found their salutation. Is it not written there, 
The stone which the builders rejected, the same is 
become the head of the corner: this is the Lord's doing, 
and it is marvellous in our eyes? You may reject me ; 
I know, indeed, that it is in your hearts to crucify me ; 
and when you have succeeded in doing that, you think 
that there is nothing more to fear from me. But have 
a care : it is not the first time in your history that the 
rejected stone has been made at last the most important 
in the building. The words of the psalm, indeed, have 
become proverbial, but all previous fulfilments of the 
proverb have been but the prophecies and forecast 
shadows of that most terrible illustration of it, which 
shall be furnished by your rejection of me ; for the cross 
will be but the lever that lifts me to the headship of 
the kingdom; and then " — and this is the second of the 
sayings which he has appended to the parable — "the 
kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to 
a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof." You have 
had your probatiou of privilege, but it is rapidly coming 
to an end ; and if you persist for but a few days longer 
in the course which you are now pursuing, your limit 
will be reached, and the advantages which you have 
forfeited will be transferred to others. " From him that 
hath not, shall be taken away even that he hath." 
Thus in this saying there were enfolded the dethrone- 
ment of the Jews from their pre-eminence among the 
nations, the withdrawal from them of their exceptional 
privileges, the destruction of their much-loved Jerusa- 
lem, and the calling of the Gentiles, — all because they 



THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 145 

knew not the clay of their visitation, and killed him, 
whom in their inmost hearts they had been compelled 
to recognize as the heir and representative of the King 
of kings. 

Then, having another illustration suggested to him 
by the figure of the stone, he goes on to his third utter- 
ance: "And whosoever shall fall on that stone shall be 
broken; but on whomsoever it shall fall, it shall grind 
him to powder." First, the stone is a passive thing, 
lying, as it were, on the way, but yet so formidable and 
dangerous, that even to stumble over it would prove 
injurious to the man that falls upon it. Then, as if the 
vision of Nebuchadnezzar had risen up before him, and 
he actually saw the stone cut from the mountain with- 
out hands, and bounding down with ever-accelerating 
speed into the valley below, he adds, " but on whomso- 
ever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." Here, 
therefore, are two different treatments of the Lord, with 
their respective consequences, foreshadowed to us. The 
first is that of those who merely for a season stumble 
over certain difficulties regarding him. They are not 
satisfied, it may be, concerning his deity ; they are 
offended perhaps, as even Peter was once, at the idea 
of his dying upon a cross ; or they cannot unravel all 
the mystery of his atonement: therefore they do not 
yet accept him. That is bad. That is hurtful. They 
fall over the stone, and are broken. Not only are they 
still unsaved by him, but their consciences become 
blunted ; they learn the habit of procrastination ; their 
wills are enfeebled, and their hearts are hardened. 
If they will not accept this stone as the foundation on 
which to rear their characters, their whole moral natures 
cannot but be injured. For we must build, either on 
Christ or on self. To build on Christ is to be founded 



146 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

on a rock, and to have the stability of that rock im- 
parted to the fabric which we raise ; but to build on 
self is to be founded on the sand, and when the storm 
comes there will be a dread catastrophe, and corre- 
sponding injury. Yet such injury may not be absolutely 
irreparable if at least it occur in time ; for those who 
have been thus hurt may be stirred up thereby to alter 
the whole plan of their lives, and begin anew by the 
acceptance of Christ as their only Saviour and Sove- 
reign, and in that case, though they can never be quite 
as they might otherwise have been, they shall be saved 
eternally. 

But if one persistently and defiantly rejects Christ, 
and justifies thereby the Jews in their treatment of him, 
he does not fall over the stone, but the stone falls upon 
him, and he is eternally destroyed. " Ground to pow- 
der," — what a terrible expression ! describing utter, 
hopeless, remediless perdition. One of the greatest of 
living English preachers has in this connection a very 
striking passage which I cannot refrain from quoting. 
" I remember," says Dr. McLaren of Manchester, " away 
up in a lonely Highland valley, where beneath a tall 
black cliff, all weather-worn and cracked and seamed, 
there lies at the foot, resting on the greensward that 
creeps round its base, a huge rock that has fallen from 
the face of the cliff. A shepherd was passing beneath 
it ; and suddenly, when the finger of God's will touched 
it, and rent it from its ancient bed in the everlasting 
rock, it came down, leaping and bounding from pinnacle 
to pinnacle, — and it fell ; and the man that was beneath 
it is there now, ground to powder. Ah, my brethren ! " 
he proceeds, " that is not my illustration ; that is Christ's. 
Therefore I say to you, since all that stand against him 
shall become as 'the chaff of the summer threshing- 



THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 147 

floor,' and be swept utterly away, make him the founda- 
tion on which you build; and when the rain sweeps 
away every refuge of lies, you will be safe and serene, 
buildecl upon the Roe& of ages." 1 

Here, my hearers, I might well conclude ; but I tarry 
only to condense the teachings of this solemn parable 
into three portable and practical remarks. 

The first is, that the greatest privilege a man can 
enjoy is to have the kingdom of God intrusted to him. 
The Jews were the most favored people of antiquity. 
They had the oracles of God committed to them. When 
others were in darkness, they enjoyed the light of rev- 
elation ; but, instead of thanking Jehovah for these 
things, they only plumed themselves upon them, as if, 
simply because they had received them, they were bet- 
ter than their neighbors. We condemn them for that ; 
but let us take heed that we are not therein uttering 
our own doom. For we are now where they were, — 
nay, our privileges are vastly more exalted than theirs. 
What they had merely in type and symbol, we have in 
reality. They had but the Old Testament, we enjoy 
also the New ; while the blessings of Palestine were as 
nothing compared with those of America. The king- 
dom of God has not merely come nigh us, but it is in 
the midst of us. From our very earliest years we have 
known all about the old, old story of Jesus and his 
love ; and Christ has been proclaimed to us in sermons, 
and sung to us in songs, and commended to us in books, 
on every hand. We are tempted to say, What could 
God have done more for any people than he has done 
for us? We have touched the hi^h-water mark of 
privilege ; and there is not a sinner in the land who 
may not hear, if he chooses, of the great salvation. 

1 McLaren's Sermons, first series, p. 13. 



148 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

You have heard of it often ; you are hearing of it 
now. Will you realize that in so doing you are enjoy- 
ing the very highest favor that a sinful man can know ? 
There is nothing better that even God can give you, 
unless } t ou are willing to accept the Saviour ; and then 
he will come in and sup with 3-ou, and you with him. 

But now, if this be so, it follows in the second place, 
that the greatest sin a man can commit is to reject 
Christ. That is the sin of sins, the condemning sin ; 
and every man to wdiom the gospel is preached must 
either commit that sin, or accept the Lord as his Sav- 
iour. He cannot be neutral. He may try to hold the 
matter in suspense, like Pilate who said, " What shall I 
then do with Jesus who is called Christ ? " but he must 
either accept or reject at last. He can do no otherwise ; 
and if he rejects, he sins against the greatest grace and 
the brightest light. 

Then, finally, there follows this terrible inference : 
The darkest doom is that of those who are guilty of 
this greatest sin. It will be more tolerable for Sodom 
and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for us, if 
we persistently reject Christ and his salvation. " On 
whomsoever " that stone " shall fall, it will grind him to 
powder." O beloved ! will you ponder these words 
well, and, if you have not yet received Christ, open 
you hearts this very moment, and let him in ? 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 149 



X. 

THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 

(Matt. xxii. 1-14. J 

This parable, like that of the wicked husbandmen, 
belongs to the Passion Week of our Lord, and deals 
with the same general subject which it illustrates. But 
as that was a development of the thought which un- 
derlay the story of the two sons, so this is, in many 
respects, an advance upon that of the wicked husband- 
men. What in that was represented as a repudiation 
of responsibility, is in this portrayed as a despising of 
favor ; the son of the householder, in that, is the king's 
son in this ; while, in the episode of the wedding gar- 
ment, the application of the principle beneath the par- 
able is widened so as to include under it not only those 
who refuse the invitations of the gospel, or contemptu- 
ously ignore them, but also those who insult the giver 
of these invitations, even when they profess to be ac- 
cepting them. The former parable stopped with the 
declaration that the vineyard would be given to other 
laborers ; but this goes forward to the time when that 
prophecy should be fulfilled, and has a word of warning 
to those who should then come into the enjoyment of 
the privileges which the Jews had forfeited. We can- 
not read it, therefore, without feeling, that, as the crisis 
of the cross is drawing near, the Lord " reveals himself 
in ever-clearer light as the central person of the king- >/ 



150 THE PARABLES OF OUR 8AVIOUB. 

dom," and sets before his hearers not only the greatness 
of the privilege, but also the vastness of the peril, that 
is involved in the possession of the gospel. 

The parable may be described as a drama in three 
acts. A king is about to give a splendid feast in 
honor of the marriage of his son. Great preparations 
had been made for the occasion. Long before the ap- 
pointed day. invitations had been sent to those whose 
presence at the banquet was desired, to notify them 
of the time which had been fixed, so that thev mio-ht 
know to keep clear of all other engagements, and be 
ready to celebrate the wedding with every demonstra- 
tion of enthusiasm. Then, on the morning of the day 
on which the festival was to be held, and in accordance 
with a custom prevalent in the East, servants were 
sent out to - call them that were bidden."' But they 
were met with a blunt refusal. Those who had been 
invited ; ' would not come.'' It was a disappointment to 
the king: yet perhaps they had acted ignorantly and 
thoughtle-->. so he gave them an opportunity for re- 
consideration: and later in the clay he sent other ser- 
vants to them, to say in his name to them, " Behold, I 
have prepared my dinner : my oxen and my fatlings are 
killed, and all things are ready : come unto the mar- 
riage." But they made light of the whole affair, as if 
it were a matter of no importance whatever. Some of 
them went on with their business on the farm and in 
the store, as usual ; deeming it of more consequence by 
far to make a little gain, than to accept the royal invi- 
tation. Others of them were actuated by such bitter 
animosity to the monarch, that u they took the servants, 
and entreated them spitefully, and slew them." This 
conduct on the part of those whom he was seeking to 
honor and bless was of such a nature that the king 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 151 

could not pass it by with impunity ; therefore " he sent 
his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned 
up their city." This is the first act of the drama ; and 
the curtain falls upon a scene not unlike that which 
was witnessed when the troops of Titus stormed the 
walls of Jerusalem, and gave its gorgeous temple to 
the flames. 

But the feast was not to be postponed because those 
first invited to it would not come to its enjoyment; 
and therefore, in the second act, we hear the king com- 
manding his servants to go into the highways, and bid 
to the marriage " as many as they could find." Then 
we see the servants going forth, and gathering men of 
every class and condition, irrespective of former char- 
acter or present rank, and asking them to the marriage. 
Next we behold the motley multitude trooping into the 
palace, and taking their places at the tables which had 
been prepared. This is the second act ; and the curtain 
falls upon a festive hall, crowded with guests from the 
east and from the west, from the north and from the 
south, all apparently filled with gladness at the grand 
event they celebrate. 

But once again the curtain rises. The scene is the 
same ; but the king has come in to look upon the guests, 
and his entrance is the signal for the outburst of rap- 
turous applause. When that has ceased, the royal eye 
scans the tables, and marks the appearance of each 
guest. For a time nothing but joy is seen upon his 
countenance; but by and by it assumes an aspect of 
sorrow, mingled with sternness and decision, for he 
sees one guest " who had not on a wedding garment." 
These garments he had himself provided : why should 
any one refuse to wear them? So he went to the per- 
son who had so insulted him, and said, " Friend, how 



152 THE PARABLES OF OUB SAVIOUR. 

earnest thou in hither not having a wedding garment ? " 
and he was speechless. Then said the king to the ser- 
vants, " Bind hirn hand and foot, and take him away, 
and cast him into outer darkness ; there shall be weep- 
ing, and gnashing of teeth."' For it is one thing to be 
called to the feast, and another thing to accept the call 
in its true and proper significance. " Many are called, 
but few are chosen." Such is the story. 

Now, in the interpretation it will be well to preserve 
the division into three parts which I have indicated. 
Of the first part, then, the central idea is the invitation 
of certain parties to a royal marriage-feast. The rela- 
tion of the Jews to their God is, all through the Old 
Testament, spoken of under the figure of the marriage 
covenant : and in the marriage of the king's son here, 
we have hinted at the truth which is broadly stated 
by Paul when he speaks of the Church as the wife of 
the Lord Jesus; and by John, when he calls it u the 
bride, the Lamb's wife." But it will be observed, that, 
as the parable proceeds, the marriage idea drops almost 
entirely out of sight, and that of the feast alone re- 
mains ; for the main design of the Lord was to teach 
certain truths under the similitude of a banquet. What, 
then, does this feast represent? Plainly, whatever it 
may be used here to symbolize, a feast suggests provis- 
ion, excellent in quality, abundant in quantity, and 
varied in character, in the enjoyment of which a mul- 
titude of guests have great fellowship and happiness. 
Now, nothing will fit that description better than the 
spiritual banquet which is set before men in the bless- 
ings of the gospel. There we have presented to us, 
pardon of sin, favor with God, peace of conscience, the 
exceeding great and precious promises of the Scrip- 
tures, access to the throne of grace, the comforts of the 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 153 

Holy Spirit, and the well-grounded assurance of eternal 
life in heaven. In the common participation of these 
things, believers have high and holy communion with 
each other and with God, which fills their souls with 
the purest and most exalted happiness ; so that to them 
the ancient oracle has been fulfilled, and " in this moun- 
tain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people a 
feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees, of fat 
things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well 
refined." 1 

This, then, being the feast, the interpretation of the 
other matters is not difficult. The king is God, and 
the son is the Lord Jesus Christ, whose marriage is his 
union to the Church, which he is ultimately to present 
to himself "without spot or wrinkle or any such thing." 
The first bidding to this feast was given to the Jews 
by the-prophets, under the Old-Testament dispensation, 
in appeals of which those in the fifty-fifth chapter of 
Isaiah may be taken as a specimen. The servants sent 
forth on the feast-day, to call them that were bidden, 
are the preachers in the lifetime of our Lord upon the 
earth, and may be held as including John the Baptist, 
the Lord himself, and especially the twelve apostles 
and the seventy disciples, who, commissioned by the 
Saviour, went forth through the length and breadth of 
Palestine, telling their countrymen everywhere that the 
kingdom of God was come nigh them ; and the result of 
their mission as a whole, though there were here and 
there individual exceptions, is only too truly described 
in the graphic words, "they would not come." The 
" other servants " sent out later in the day to say, " Be- 
hold, I have prepared my dinner ; my oxen and my fat- 
lings are killed, and all things are ready : come unto 

Isa. xxv. 6. 



154 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the marriage, " — are the preachers of the gospel after 
Pentecost, who were commissioned to proclaim salvation 
full and free to all who would believingly and peni- 
tently accept its blessings, but who still for a season 
restricted their labors to the Jews ; and, though they 
met with signal successes in many places, yet the result 
of their work as a whole was that the Jewish nation as 
such rejected their overtures. Some did so in the most 
disdainful manner, not deeming them worth any atten- 
tion whatsoever, because their minds were exclusively 
devoted to worldly affairs ; but others were exasperated 
by the very offers, because the presentation of pardon 
involved in it a tacit accusation of sin, and they turned 
upon the preachers with persecuting fury, stoning 
Stephen, killing James with the sword, and haling 
others, women as well as men, to prison, — all of which 
may be found described in the early chapters of the 
book of the Acts of the Apostles. Nay, we need not 
confine ourselves to the early chapters ; for all through 
that book we see that the Jews, to whom Paul every- 
where made the first offer of the gospel, were always 
the most bitter, the most implacable, and the most 
pertinacious persecutors of the apostles and their 
assistants. 

The destruction of those who had maltreated the ser- 
vants, and the burning-up of their city, represent the 
rejection of the Jews, which culminated in the over- 
throw of Jerusalem, when the Roman armies, which 
were "the rod of God's anger," took away the place of 
the Jewish nation, and scattered the people over the 
world. Thus far, therefore, the parable of the marriage- 
feast runs parallel with that of the wicked husband- 
men. 

But now, in the mission of the servants to the high- 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 155 

ways, there is superadded the calling of the Gentiles. 
The wedding must be furnished with guests ; and there- 
fore, though the Jews despised the invitation, others 
were called in their room. As Paul said to his fellow- 
countrymen in the synagogue of the Pisidian Antioch, 
" It was necessary that the word of God should first 
have been spoken to you ; but seeing ye put it from you, 
and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo ! 
we turn to the Gentiles ; " 1 and they, or at least many 
of them, gladly received its message of mercy. This is 
the second part of the parable. 

Yet a warning had to be given to them also, and this 
is furnished in the concluding section of the story. To 
understand it thoroughly, we must believe that the not 
unusual custom of providing the guests with the re- 
quired wedding garment had been followed by the host, 
but that this man had refused to avail himself of the 
offer, and had defiantly and contemptuously pushed past 
the attendants, and taken his place at the table, alto- 
gether disregarding the commands of the monarch, and 
thinking perhaps that his own dress was too good to 
cover. As a recent writer has said, 2 " Similar audacity 
in entering a king's presence without putting on the 
robe sent by him for that purpose has been known to 
cost a prime minister his life. A traveller who was 
invited, with the ambassadors he accompanied, to the 
table of the Persian king, says, 'We were told by the 
officer, that we, according to their usage, must hang 
the splendid vests that were sent us from the king, over 
our dresses, and so appear in his presence. The ambas- 
sadors at first refused ; but the officer urged it so ear- 

1 Acts xiii. 46. 

2 The Parables as recorded by Matthew, by Marcus Dods, D.D., 
pp. 224, 225. 



156 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

nestly, alleging, as also did others, that- the omission 
would greatly displease the king, since all other envoys 
observed such a custom, that at last they consented, and 
hanged, as we did, the splendid vests over their shoul- 
ders.' " Thus this rejection of the preferred garment by 
this man in the parable indicated a lack of sympathy 
with the giver of the feast, and a positive disaffection. 
toward him, as really as the refusal of the invitation by 
the others had done ; and so a punishment equally severe 
with that which had been meted out to them was visited 
on him, for he was excluded from the feast, — put out 
into the darkness of the night, to misery, unsheltered 
and unrelieved. 

Now, what does this wedding garment represent ? 
Man}'- have been forward to answer that it symbolizes 
the robe of Christ's all-perfect righteousness ; but my 
conviction is, that its significance goes deeper even than 
that. When Paul exhorts the Romans to " put on the 
Lord Jesus Christ," he is urging them to holiness of 
character, rather than to become partakers of the justify- 
ing righteousness of Christ ; and in that injunction, 
as it seems to me, we have the interpreting clause of 
this wedding garment. The insisting upon the wearing 
of this festive dress is thus, as Goebel has expressively 
put it, 1 "nothing but the requirement, indispensably 
grounded in the ethical nature of the kingdom of God, 
that every one who would actually have part in its 
blessedness [should] acquire the corresponding moral 
character, and therefore obtain the moral righteousness 
that corresponds to the holy will, supreme in God's 
kingdom." In this view of the case, therefore, the re- 
fusing to wear that garment indicates " the want of a 
moral character and walk corresponding to God's holy 

1 Goebel on the Parables, p. 374. 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 157 

will." The garment, therefore, is a character consistent 
with the acceptance — simple, sincere, and loyal — of the 
gospel of Christ. For there is no true acceptance of 
the gospel where there is no beginning of holiness, and 
no growth in likeness to God himself; according as Paul 
has said, "Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not 
inherit the kingdom of God ? Be not deceived : neither 
fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, 
nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, 
nor extortioners shall inherit the kingdom of God." 1 It 
is one thing to profess to accept the gospel : it is an- 
other thing to accept it in reality. It is one thing to say 
that you are a Christian, and another to be a Christian 
indeed. It is one thing to be called, and another thing 
to respond to that call whole-heartedly and in its entire- 
ty, so as to make manifest that we are " called, choice, 
and faithful." 

Such is the simple yet solemn explanation of this 
important parable. Its one great lesson is, that the 
enjoyment of privilege does not insure the improve- 
ment of privilege ; and its one terrible warning is, that 
the abuse of privilege will result in the condemnation 
of God's wrath. These principles are applied, first, to 
the case of the Jews, who for their continued resistance 
to God's invitations were rejected at last by God, and 
given over to destruction ; and, second, to the Gentiles, 
who are thereby informed that despite the gathering of 
all classes into the kingdom which the Jews had for- 
feited, every one who has not a character in harmony 
with God's will be cast out into perdition. And the 
fact that only a single guest was thus discovered and 
treated gives awful emphasis to the truths that we have 
to do with God as individuals, and not as classes merely, 

l 1 Cor. vi. 9, 10. 



158 THE PARABLES OF QUE SAVIOUB. 

and that not even one. without the garment of holiness, 
will be able to conceal himself among the other mem- 
bers of the kingdom, from the all-searching eye of the 
eternal King. 

But now, leaving the drapery of the parable, and its 
original application to the Jews and Gentiles, as such, 
let us consider very briefly the four different ways of 
treating God's invitations in the gospel which are here 

set before our view. 

First, we have it complacently ignored by those who 
went their ways to their farms and to their merchandise. 
Xow, on a superficial examination, one is apt to imagine 
that those who act in this fashion are less guilty than 
the remnant who despitefully entreated the servants and 
slew them, and that, consequently, they are not in such 
great danger as these others. But both of these ideas 
are mischievous and untrue. Look first at the matter 
of their guilt, and I am sure I am not wrong in afnrin- 
ing that we feel it a greater insult to be slighted than 
to be opposed. He who ignores me altogether does 
thereby say in effect that I am not worthy of his notice ; 
and I feel that to be a greater contempt of me than if 
he sought to treat me with violence. But man is made 
in the image of God ; and it is therefore probable that 
the insult to his grace is felt by him to be greater in 
the case of those who simply '-make light of it,*' than 
in that of those who openly and defiantly reject it. 
Nay, is not something like that involved in the 
Saviour's words to the angel of the church at Laodicea : 
M I would thou were cold or hot : so because thou art 
lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot. I will spew thee 
out of my mouth "" ? * He prefers an open enemy to one 

1 Rev. iii. 15, 16. 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 159 

who treats him with indifference. Now, carry that 
principle out, and you come to the conclusion that to 
treat God's overtures in the gospel as not worth your 
notice is a more serious offence, in his eyes, than it is 
to attack him with open and avowed enmity. Yet 
how many are thus despising the gospel and the gos- 
pel's Lord ! Jesus stands knocking at the door of 
their hearts, sometimes through conscience, and some- 
times through trial, sometimes through the spoken words 
of his messengers, and sometimes through the still small 
voice of his Spirit ; but they heed him not. They go on 
with their business, their pleasure, their sins, just as if 
he were not there. They use him in such a way as 
would be insulting to a fellow-man, and then solace 
themselves with the opiate that they have not rejected 
him, and so their guilt cannot be great. Friends, it is a 
delusion of the Devil thus to think. Awake, I beseech 
you, to the real nature of the case, and beware of doing 
dishonor thus to the King of kings ! 

But it is equally untrue that he who thus slights the 
message of God's grace is in smaller danger than others. 
He who neglects a warning, equally with him who 
opposes the messenger that gives the warning, leaves 
the purport of it unheeded, and becomes a victim to 
his folly. If I were in a boat on the river in the 
rapids, it would not be necessary, to insure my destruc- 
tion, that I should enter into violent controversy with 
those who would urge me from the shore, to take heed 
and come to land : all I should have to do would be to 
shut my ears to their entreaty, and leave myself alone ; 
the current would do the rest. Neglect of the gospel 
is thus just as perilous as the open rejection of it. 
Indeed, half the evils of our daily life in temporal things 
are caused by neglect ; and countless are the souls who 



160 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

are lost for this same cause. Leave your farm for a 
little, then ; let your merchandise alone for a season ; 
settle first, and before all things else, what you will do 
with this invitation which God has given you to the 
gospel banquet: then, that accepted, your farm will 
become to you a section of God's vineyard, and your 
business will be a means of glorifying him. 

But, in the second place, we have the gospel-offer 
violently rejected. The remnant despitefully entreated 
and slew the servants of the king. That is no longer 
common among us. There have been times when they 
who sought to preach the gospel did so at the risk of 
their lives ; but those days, thank God, are gone, never, 
as we hope, to return again. Yet there is still a violent 
rejection of the gospel, common among certain classes. 
There are some who are open infidels, and decry every 
thing that is associated with the Church of Christ. 
They will not listen with patience to its ministers, and 
they take every opportunity of setting themselves up 
against their message. Oh that they would hear the 
voice which arrested the persecuting Saul on the way 
to Damascus ! " It is hard for thee to kick against the 
goads." The goads are uninjured, but what of your 
feet the while ? You cannot harm the gospel, but } r ou 
can harm and you are harming your own souls. It 
may seem easy to oppose the messenger ; but it is 
another thing to set yourselves up against Him by 
whom he is commissioned, and that is what you do in 
opposing the gospel invitation. Why will you thus 
break yourselves by rushing against the thick bosses 
of the Almighty's buckler ? Bethink 3 T ourselves there- 
fore, while ye may; accept the proffered favor now, lest 
at length ye be overtaken with swift destruction as the 



THE ROYAL MARRIAGE-FEAST. 161 

voice of the Almighty cries, " Behold, ye despisers, and 
wonder, and perish." Ah, what words are these: "He 
sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, 
and burned up their city " ! And if God spared not the 
ancient people of his love and choice when they re- 
jected his own Son, take heed lest he also spare not 
thee. 

We have here, thirdly, the inconsistency and insolence 
of the man who professed to accept the invitation, and 
yet failed to comply with the conditions on which 
alone true acceptance of it was possible. He pushed 
into the festive hall without having on a wedding gar- 
ment. So there are to-day many who have nominally 
accepted Christ, while yet it is evident, from the absence 
of the holiness which he requires, that they are really 
rejecting him. This comes nearer home to many of us, 
perhaps, than either of the other cases which I have 
specified. For the Church of Christ has won for itself 
respectability, and importance in the world ; and con- 
nection with it is, in itself, a sort of certificate of stand- 
ing and reputation in the community : so that men may 
be tempted to join themselves with it for the temporal 
benefits which it may bring, and without giving any 
heed to the requirements which the Lord Jesus de- 
mands of its members. They may profess to accept 
his invitation, and even take their places at his table, 
without having the character which is a constant ac- 
companiment of the sincere reception of his grace. As 
one 2 has thoughtfully said here, " conformity to God, 
ability to rejoice with God and in God, humble and 
devoted reverence, a real willingness to do honor to the 
King's Son, — these are the great attainments. But 

1 Dods on the Parables, as before, p. 228. 



162 TUE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

these constitute the wedding garment, without which we 
cannot remain in his presence, or abide his searching 
gaze. It will come to be a matter between each one 
of you singly and him ; and it is the heart you bear 
towards him, that will determine your destiny. No 
mere appearance of accepting his invitation, no associ- 
ating of yourself with those who love him, no outward 
entrance into his presence, no making use of the right 
language, is any thing to the purpose. What is wanted 
is a profound sympathy with God, a real delight in 
what is holy, a radical acceptance of his will. In other 
words, and as the most untutored conscience might see, 
what is wanted is a state of mind in you which God 
can delight in, and approve of, and hold fellowship 
with." 

Now, the acceptance of the gospel invitation in that 
state of mind ; the acceptance of it really, sincerely, 
whole-heartedly, — is the fourth way of dealing with it 
that is set before us in the parable ; and that state of 
mind he will give to us, even as the king here providecL 
the wedding garments. The invitation is to all, with- 
out limitation or restriction, bad or good, old or young, 
of whatever color or nation. All are called ; but they 
only truly accept, who, in so doing, yield themselves up 
to God, to be as he wills, to do as he commands, to live 
as he ordains. For this feast is not a thing for an hour 
or two, but for a lifetime, nay, for an eternity ; and we 
could not endure to be with God, if we were not also 
growing in likeness to God. Thus, from another side 
of the subject, the truth impressed upon us by the epi- 
sode of the wedding garment is the same as Jesus 
unfolded to Nicodemus : " Except a man be born again, 
he cannot see the kingdom of God." You cannot 



THE ROYAL II AERI AGE-FEAST. 163 

have the forgiveness without the purity, the happiness 
without the holiness, the feast without the garment; 
but when you are ready to submit yourselves to the 
great law of the kingdom, which links privilege and 
character indissolubly together, then you may have 
both. 



164 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XI. 

THE TEN VIRGINS. 

(Matt. xxv. 1-13. J 

The primary reference of this parable is to the 
second coming of Christ, and it was designed to enforce 
the lesson of constant watchfulness for that event. In 
the discourse which precedes this chapter, our Lord, 
while speaking most unqualifiedly of the certainty of 
his coming, and declaring that the time of it was known 
only to the Father, had repeatedly emphasized the state- 
ment that it should take the world by surprise, so that 
his own people ought to be always in readiness to meet 
him. That was the point to which his exhortations 
tended, and that also is the pivot on which the issues 
of the parable turn ; for the unexpectedness of the 
appearance of the bridegroom revealed at once the dif- 
ference between the two groups of virgins. 

The story itself need not detain us long, for it is so 
perfect in its simplicity that nothing is required to aid 
us in its comprehension. Any attempt to tell it in 
other words would only produce a weak dilution of the 
original narrative, and all efforts at pointing out its 
beauties would be like holding up a taper to display 
the glory of the sun. It is so realistic in its details as 
to give an accurate description of an Eastern marriage- 
procession, and it may well enough have been founded 
on some actual history. But what can equal the group- 



THE TEN VIBGIJSTS. 165 

ing of the various figures ; the startling suddenness of 
the midnight cry ; the haste of the surprised sleepers ; 
and the sadness of the disappointed ones, as they cry 
with piercing earnestness, " Lord, Lord, open to us " ? 
Even as a work of art, this parable is faultless as its 
author; and though there were no spiritual meaning 
throbbing beneath it, we could not but be impressed 
with its simple naturalness, its rapid movement, its tra- 
gic pathos, and its silent close as the midnight gloom 
folds in upon and hides the sadness of those who are 
shut out. When, however, we go deeper into it, and 
discover its spiritual significance, we find ourselves 
concerned ; and we have no time for admiring the 
beauties of the parable, because of the pressing and per- 
sonal importance of the truths which it suggests. It 
shall be my aim now to set these before you as briefly 
and pointedly as possible. I shall not attempt to give 
a meaning to every minute detail of the story, but con- 
tent myself with setting before you, in a few pertinent 
remarks, what I judge to be the pith and marrow of its 
instruction. 

I. Let us observe, then, in the first place, that we have 
here two characters contrasted. Of the ten virgins, five 
were wise, and five were foolish. Now, that we may 
define the difference between them, it is needful that 
we have first a clear conception of the things in which 
they were alike. Note, then, that they all had some 
knowledge of, and regard for, the bridegroom, and de- 
sired to honor him by going forth to meet him as he led 
home his bride. Note, further, that they all had lamps 
which at the moment were burning. Note, once more, 
that while the bridegroom tarried they all slumbered 
and slept. Not until his coming was announced did 



1G6 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the difference between them develop itself. But then 
it was seen, that some of them had prudently provided 
for certain contingencies by taking with them a reserve 
supply of oil, while others had contented themselves 
with simply filling their lamps. Now, it is indispensable 
to a right understanding of the parable, that we settle 
plainly what is meant in the one case by the presence, 
and in the other by the absence, of this store of oil. 
Clearly, in all outward things the wise and the foolish 
virgins were alike. The difference between them was 
internal. But what, precisely, was it ? The going out 
with a lamp is commonly understood to mean the mak- 
ing of a profession, while the absence of the reserve store 
of oil is supposed to signify the want of sincerity in that 
profession. The foolish virgins are thus held to repre- 
sent hypocritical adherents of Christ, while the wise are 
taken to signify genuine disciples. 

But this restriction of the oil in reserve, to sincerity, 
seems to me to narrow unduly the scope of the parable. 
For the foolish virgins had a real regard, such as it was, 
for the bridegroom : they had actually gone out so far 
to meet him, and they were dreadfully disappointed by 
their exclusion from the feast. They did not feign any 
of these things. There was a genuineness about them, 
so far as they went ; only they did not go far enough. 
Hence I cannot restrict the reference of this part of the 
story to deliberate hypocrites. Indeed, I believe that 
the number of those who make a Christian profession 
by connecting themselves with the visible church, while 
yet they consciously design to impose upon its office- 
bearers, is comparatively small; and therefore, if we 
confine the warning conveyed in the fate of the foolish 
virgins to them, I greatly fear that many whom it was 
designed to arouse may fail to perceive its reference to 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 167 

them, and may sleep on in security despite its call to 
watchfulness. I am disposed, therefore, to regard the 
foolish virgins as symbolizing those who have had some 
feelings of attachment to the Lord Jesus, and certain 
impulses Christ-ward to which they yielded at the time ; 
but they were not constant. Their emotion was a real 
thing, and when they were acting upon it you could 
not call them hypocrites ; but it was not the right thing. 
They were animated by impulse alone, not by principle 
or conviction. Their religion did not go down into the 
lowest depths of their nature, but was rather a thing 
of surface. It went down a little waj r , but it did not 
go the whole way ; and therefore, when it was put to 
the proof, it failed. Thus I should identify the foolish 
virgins with those who in the parable of the sower are 
represented by the seed " which fell upon rocky ground 
where it had not much earth, and forthwith it sprung 
up because it had no deepness of earth ; and when the 
sun was up it was scorched, and because it had no root 
it withered away ; " and of whom our Lord himself thus 
gives the description, " He that received the seed into 
rocky places, the same is he that heareth the word, and 
anon with joy receiveth it ; yet hath he not root in him- 
self, but dureth for a while ; for when tribulation or 
persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he 
is offended." 1 Here, you observe, there was a real 
reception of the seed, and a real growth so far ; and so, 
when a profession was made, you could not call it hypo- 
critical. But it was not abiding. It wanted depth. 
It had no root ; or, in the imagery of the parable before 
me, there was no reserve of oil from which to replen- 
ish the lamp. 

So, again, you have the same phase of character 

1 Matt, xiii- 5, 6, 20, 21. 



168 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

hinted at in the Lord's words as recorded by Luke: 1 
" For which of you, intending to build a tower, sitteth 
not down first, and counteth the cost, whether he have 
not sufficient to finish it ? lest haply, after he have laid 
the foundation, and is not able to finish it, all that be- 
hold it begin to mock him, saying, This man began to 
build, and was not able to finish. Or what king, going 
to make war against another king, sitteth not down first, 
and consulteth whether he be able with ten thousand 
to meet him that cometh against him with twenty thou- 
sand ? " Now, that was precisely the case of these fool- 
ish virgins. They had not thought of the possibility 
of the bridegroom's delay. They had not sufficiently 
counted the cost ; and so they had nothing in reserve 
on which they could fall back, and by which they could 
be sustained through a time of emergency. 

But if that be so, you are ready to ask how it comes 
that this particular difference is set forth here by the 
having, or the not having, of oil in reserve. Now, the 
answer to that must be, that the shape of the analogy is 
determined by the character of the story, so that what 
in the parable of the sower is indicated by the having 
of no root, is here portrayed by the having of no oil. 
Yet it is interesting to note, that throughout the Scrip- 
tures oil is used to represent the Holy Spirit, and that 
in their union to the Holy Spirit, formed by their faith 
in Christ, and maintained by their constant study of 
his word, their habitual dependence on him in prayer, 
and their continuous obedience to his commands, believ- 
ers are represented as having that unfailing supply of 
strength by which they are sustained in every duty and 
prepared for every emergency. As in Zechariah's 
vision 2 the two olive-trees stood, one on each side of 

1 Luke xiv. 28-32. 2 z^ch. iv. 2-4, 11, 12. 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 1G9 

the golden lamp, emptying into its bowls the oil out of 
themselves, and thus sustaining its never-failing light ; 
so the Holy Spirit in the believer's heart gives him grace 
sufficient for him in every hour of need. 

The separate vessel in which this oil was carried by 
the wise virgins must not so far mislead us as to induce 
us to believe that this oil is something outside of the 
believer. It is rather the reserve force of character in 
the Christian himself, which has been accumulated by 
him through his constant faith in Christ and obedience 
to him, whereby he has maintained unbroken his union 
to the Holy Ghost. His religion has a root in principle 
and conviction, which draws its sustenance from the 
Lord himself. It has been clearly understood, intelli- 
gently received, and deliberately maintained. It may 
have had little of the effervescence of emotional excite- 
ment about it at the first, but there was a deep deter- 
mination in his soul. He has forecast the future, and, 
knowing life own weakness, he has sought ever to hold 
fast by the strength of the Omnipotent, so that he has 
been able to stand the strain of every storm. You see, 
then, wherein the difference between these two charac- 
ters lies. It is not in sincerity so much as in constancy ; 
not in leaf so much as in root ; not in emotion so much 
as in principle ; not in surface so much as in depth ; 
not in the manifestation of character at the moment, so 
much as in the reserve force of character that can meet 
any contingency. 

II. Now, this analysis of the difference between the 
two classes of characters here symbolized prepares the 
way for the second remark which is suggested by the par- 
able ; namely, that character is revealed by crisis. " At 
midnight there was a cry made, Behold, the bridegroom 



170 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

conieth : go ye out to meet him : " and this startled the 
virgins from their slumber. No blame is here attached 
to them for having fallen asleep. Both classes, wise 
and foolish alike, were folded in unconsciousness ; but 
this apparently was necessary, in order that both alike 
should be taken unawares. Again, it is, for the pur- 
poses of exposition, immaterial whether the coming of 
the bridegroom be interpreted to mean his appearance 
at the end of all things, or, as some have preferred to 
understand it, his coming to begin a personal reign 
upon the earth : the principle involved is, that he will 
come unexpectedly, and that the suddenness of his 
appearance will be a test of character. These virgins 
were all taken by surprise; and that revealed at once 
which of them were prepared, and which of them were 
not prepared, to meet the bridegroom. 

The great truth here taught, therefore, is that char- 
acter is revealed by emergency. It is in moments of 
surprise that a man's true self comes out to view. He 
is the ablest general who can in an instant find some 
resource when an ambushed foe starts up before him. 
He is the most skilful mariner, who, in sudden ex- 
tremity, can rise to the occasion, and bring his vessel 
and his crew safely into port. Nothing will more cor- 
rectly reveal what is in a man, than the coming upon 
him of some crushing and unlooked-for crisis. Let it 
be temporal ruin by the failure of all his calculations, 
or the disappointment of all his hopes: let it be the 
entrance of the death-angel into his home, and the 
removal from it of his nearest and dearest earthly 
friend ; let it be his own prostration by some serious 
illness which puts him face to face with his dissolution : 
and forthwith the extent of his resources is unfolded, 
and it is at once discovered both bv others and bv him- 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 171 

self, whether he is animated by unfailing faith in the 
Lord Jesus Christ, and sustained by the grace of the 
Holy Spirit, or whether he has been deceiving himself, 
and all the while relying on some other support. It 
was a shrewd remark of Andrew Fuller, that a man has 
only as much religion as he can command in trial. Let 
us therefore look back upon the past, and analyze our 
experience at such testing times as those to which I 
have referred. We have all had them. We have all 
heard already, in some form or other, this midnight cry, 
" Behold, the Bridegroom cometh ; " for, in every such 
surprise as those which I have described, Jesus was 
coming to us. How did we meet him then ? Did our 
lamps go out ? or were we able to trim them, and keep 
them burning brightly all through ? Oh, if by any 
such event we discovered our utter resourcelessness, let 
us betake ourselves now to Christ, that he may thor- 
oughly renew us by his Holy Spirit, and so prepare us 
for that last and solemnest crisis when over the graves 
of the slumbering dead the archangel shall cry out, 
" Behold, the Bridegroom cometh," and all shall arise 
to stand before his great white throne. In mercy these 
minor surprises have been sent to show ourselves to us 
before the last and greatest one. Let us see to it, 
therefore, that we learn true wisdom from them, and 
so forecast the future as to prepare for it by maintain- 
ing unbroken fellowship with the Holy Spirit. 

III. But now, in the third place, let us observe, as 
suggested by this parable, that character is a personal 
thing, and cannot be given by one man to another, but 
must be acquired and manifested by each one for him- 
self. In the moment of urgency, the foolish said unto 
the wise, " Give us of your oil, for our lamps are going 



172 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

out." But the wise answered, " Not so, lest there be 
not enough for us and you ; but go ye rather to them 
that sell, and buy for yourselves." In the house of a 
well-known citizen of Boston, there is an exquisite 
group in marble, representing the wise and foolish 
virgins. The wise is kneeling, in the act of trimming 
her lamp ; and the foolish, with a face full of the most 
pathetic entreaty, seems begging from her a share of 
the oil which she is pouring in to feed the flame ; but 
her sister, with a look of inexpressible sadness, and her 
hand uplifted as if to guard her treasure, is as if she 
were saying, "Not so." It is a touching rendering of 
the parable ; and, as I looked at it, I was not surprised 
to be told that a famous New-England essayist had said, 
as he was gazing at it, " She should have given her the 
oil." Who has not often sympathized with that feeling 
as he read the parable ? We are apt to think that the 
five sisters were just a little stingy, and that what seems 
to be their selfishness was not at all in keeping with the 
benevolence which the gospel enjoins. But, not to 
insist upon the fact that it is impossible to construct an 
allegory which will hold in every particular, the answer 
made by the owner of the group to the man of genius 
is conclusive. " If," said he, " you and your neighbor 
have each signed a bill for a certain sum to fall due on 
a certain date, and you by dint of economy and perse- 
verance have been able to lay by just enough to meet 
your own obligation, while your neighbor, wasting his 
hours on trifles, has made no provision for the day of 
settlement ; and if, on the morning on which the bills 
fall due, he should come, beseeching you to give him 
some of your money to help him to pay his debt, — would 
you give it him ? " That is a pecuniary illustration ; 
and there is no evading the force of the argument, even 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 173 

when it is so put. But the parable treats of character; 
and that may be always labelled "not transferable" for 
its qualities cannot be given by one man to another, 
even if he were ever so willing to part with them. You 
cannot give* me your patience to support me in the hour 
of my anguish. I cannot give you my courage to fortify 
you for the discharge of dangerous duty. There is 
much, indeed, that we can and ought to do for each 
other. We may pray for each other. We may direct 
the anxious one to Christ. We may sympathize with 
the sufferer in his time of trial. We may, through long 
years of 'intimate companionship, even do much to help 
to form the character of a friend. But we cannot give 
to another the qualities which we ourselves possess, but 
in which he is deficient ; for these are not like oil or 
wine or money, which can be passed from hand to hand. 
They are a man's own untransferable possession, and 
that is the truth which is emphasized by the act of the 
wise virgins in refusing to share their oil with their fool- 
ish sisters. This is a matter far too little thought of by 
us all. We give so much to each other, and receive so 
much from each other, in common life, that we are apt 
to suppose that in moral things, as well as in secular, 
there may also be this mutual reciprocity. But it is 
not so. The severest passages in a man's life isolate 
him from his fellows, and he has to go through them by 
himself. Abraham received no strength from man when 
he went calmly up Moriah to offer Isaac in sacrifice. 
Jacob was " left alone " on that memorable night when 
there wrestled with him the mysterious angel till the 
breaking of the day ; and times of peril and suffering, 
such as temporal calamity or personal affliction bring, 
must be met by each alone in the strength of that char- 
acter which he has chosen to make and mould for him- 



174 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

self in the past. When we come to die, we must meet 
the last enemy, not with the faith and courage of the 
friends who stand around our bed, but each for himself 
alone in his own character. 

Now, if that be so, how perilous it is to leave off 
preparation for these testing times until they have come 
upon us ! If we would meet them satisfactorily, we 
must fit ourselves for them in common things, and 
when no such emergency is upon us. Here, therefore, 
comes in with peculiar force the closing moral of the 
story : " Watch ye, therefore, for in such an hour as ye 
think not the Son of man cometh." He who is faithful 
in that which is least is faithful in that which is great- 
est ; and he who has formed his character by faith in 
the Lord Jesus Christ, and obedience to him in the ordi- 
nary matters of daily life, is he also who can meet the 
solemnest experiences without a quiver, and is prepared 
for any sudden surprise. We all know how true that 
is in common life. When, in times of danger, some 
great leader comes suddenly to the front, and shows 
that he has the very qualities which the occasion needs, 
it will always be found that he has been preparing him- 
self, — unconsciously, perhaps, but really, — for years, 
by the careful discipline of daily labor, for the work 
which is now so successfully performed by him. While 
others were asleep, he was at his toil ; and by the study 
of many earnest months, perhaps also by the labor of 
many midnight hours, he has been laying up that 
reserve supply, on which at the moment of necessity 
he has been able to draw. Thus, though the revelation 
of his ability may have been sudden, the growth of it 
has been gradual ; and because in times of quiet and 
safety he kept up the discipline of work, the crisis which 
swept others into oblivion only floated him into fame. 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 175 

Now, the same thing holds in the spiritual department. 
If in our daily life we seek to form and maintain, by 
the help of the Holy Spirit and through faith in Christ, 
a holy character, then, when the testing hour comes, we 
shall be able to stand. But if we have been satisfying 
ourselves with a merely nominal Christianity, and have 
not endeavored to carry out in every respect the princi- 
ples of the gospel, then the crisis of sudden temptation 
or unexpected trial will only reveal our weakness, and 
we shall be proved to be none of Christ's. The daily 
work of the blacksmith not only leaves, as its result, 
the articles which that day he has made, but adds also 
a certain deposit to the strength of his arm and the 
skill in his craft, which he has in store for the under- 
taking of something else. So, every time we perform a 
duty out of regard to Christ, the soul is made thereby 
so much the stronger for something else ; and every 
time we overcome a temptation through faith in Christ, 
the soul is made so much the mightier for the resistance 
of the next assault. The daily life of the man who 
meets every duty as something to be done for Jesus, 
and bears every trial as something to be borne for 
Jesus, has its result not only in the doing of these 
duties, and the bearing of these trials, but also in the 
deposit of reserve force which is left thereby in his 
character for future emergencies. 

Here, as it seems to me, therefore, is the full mean- 
ing of that store of oil which the wise virgins carried 
with them ; and if that be so, it gives, as we have 
said, new point to the injunction with which the para- 
ble concludes : " Watch ye, therefore, for ye know 
neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of 
man cometh." For, in a very important sense, the 
Son of man is coming to us every hour of every day. 



176 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Eacli new hour brings new duties and responsibili- 
ties from him to us. The last one we had laid some 
new obligation on us. It brought some work to be 
done, or some evil to be resisted, or some privilege 
to be improved. Have we risen to the occasion? If 
we have, then we have brought out of it some reserve 
force of character, on which afterwards we may draw ; 
but if we have not, then we have come out of it weaker 
than we were before we entered it. Thus, whether we 
will confess it to ourselves or not, there is a constant 
process going on within us, either of invigoration or of 
deterioration ; and, if we meet Christ continually as he 
comes to us in the common duties of a common day, 
we shall not be dismayed at last when he comes in state 
with the flaming outriders of his majesty. He is the 
same Christ, and our acquaintance with himself will 
keep us from being terrified by the accessories that are 
round about him. 

The upshot of the matter, then, is, that each one of 
us is making for himself the character in which he is 
to meet all future emergencies ; and, according as we 
make that, we shall be found at last with no oil where- 
with to trim our lamps, or with a reserve supply, from 
which we may replenish them, and keep alive their 
light. For we cannot give to or receive from each ot^er 
here. How important, therefore, it is, that we should 
make that character after the pattern and on the princi- 
ples of Christ ! Here is the plan : " Add to your faith 
virtue ; and to virtue, knowledge ; and to knowledge, 
temperance ; and to temperance, patience ; and to pa- 
tience, godliness ; and to godliness, brotherly kindness ; 
and to brotherly kindness, charity." * Thus the faith is 
the first, and the love is the cope-stone ; but the faith 

i 2 Pet. i. 5-7. 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 177 

itself must rest on Christ. Let us begin with that, and 
go on after this plan, seeking every day to serve the 
Lord ; and so, singularly enough, the longer our lamps 
shall burn, the larger also will our reserve of oil become, 
and in the end "an entrance shall be ministered to us 
abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord 
and Saviour Jesus Christ." 

IV. But, as another truth suggested by this parable, 
I remark finally that lost opportunities cannot be re- 
called. When the door was shut, the foolish virgins 
could find no entrance into the feast, though they 
sought it with the most agonizing earnestness. Now, we 
shall greatly miss the practical value of this thought if 
we restrict it only to the opportunities to which death 
puts a period. No doubt that is the most solemn appli- 
cation of the analogy involved in the words, "and the 
door was shut." But every day is bringing opportuni- 
ties, which, if we neglect them, can never return again. 
Others may come, but these will come never more. 
Thus, to illustrate from God's offers of grace, I pro- 
claim to you now the gospel of forgiveness and regener- 
ation on the condition of your repenting, and returning 
to the Lord. You may refuse it to-night ; and it is pos- 
sible that five years hence God may again bring you 
and me face to face, and I may repeat the offer which 
I have just made. It will look the same ; but it is not 
the same as I am making now, for, though it will make 
the same demand on you, it will have in it five years 
less of happiness and usefulness than that which I 
make here to-night. You may go away rejecting it 
again ; and ten years hence, it is not probable, but it is 
possible, God may again bring us together, and I may 
then again press on your acceptance God's overtures in 



178 THE PARABLES OF OUR 8AVIOUB. 

the same words. It will look the same offer, and it 
will make the same demand : but it will not be the same 
ffer, for it will contain in it ten years less of happi- 
ness and usefulness than that which I press upon you 
now. You know the story of the ancient sibyl who 
came to King Tarquin offering for sale nine books 
which she declared would be of great value to him in 
the government of Rome. She asked what seemed an 
exorbitant price, and he would not buy them. On that 
she retired, and burned three of the books : then she 
came back, and asked the same sum for the remaining 
six. He again refused; and she retired, and burned 
three more, only to come back, and ask the same price 
for the remaining three. Then, by the advice of his 
councillors, he secured them on her own terms. Xow, 
beneath that old fable there is an important truth : for, 
the longer we refuse God's overtures, the less these 
overtures contain, while the demand upon us is still the 
same for the remainder. How many more of these 
books of privilege are you going to suffer to be de- 
stroyed? And what a motive there is in ail this for 
immediate acceptance of God's offer of mercy ! 

But we see another application of this truth in the 
openings for service which God continually puts before 
us. We may have to-day an opportunity of doing good 
or of getting good. If we let that slip, the door that 
opened to it will be shut, and it never will be opened 
again. Other doors may open, but that one never 
more. Ah, how much more watchfid and industrious 
we would be through life, if we more constantly remem- 
bered that ! But then at last comes death, and shuts 
the door of all opportunity, putting an end to our pro- 
bationary state. O friends, shall that door shut us in, 
or shut us out, from the marriage-feast ? That is for us 



THE TEN VIRGINS. 179 

the question of questions ; and if we would not be guilty 
of the folly of these short-sighted virgins, it becomes us 
to look well to our supply of oil. For it will be too late 
to go for it when it should be already in our lamps. 
And oh the agony of finding ourselves at length 
excluded from the heavenly feast so long as that feast 
lasts ! Very powerfully has the English poet-laureate 
set the lesson of this parable to the music of his melo- 
dious verse, and his lines will form the most fitting 
close to our meditation on it. 

" Late, late, so late ! and dark the night and chill ; 
Late, late, so late ! but we can enter still." 
"Too late, too late ! ye cannot enter now." 



" No light had we ; for that we do repent ; 
And learning that, the Bridegroom will relenl 
" Too late, too late ! ye cannot enter now. 



" No light ! so late ! and dark and chill the night 1 
Oh, let us in, that we may find the light ! " 
" Oh, no ! too late ! ye cannot enter now." 

" Have we not heard the Bridegroom is so sweet ? 
Oh, let us in, though late, to kiss his feet ! " 
" Too late, too late ! ye cannot enter now." 

May God grant that these terrible words shall never 
be addressed to any one of us ! Amen. 



180 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XII. 

THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 

(Matt. xxv. 14-30.) 

The parable of the talents, which forms our subject 
for this evening, has in it so much in common with 
that of the pounds, which is given in the nineteenth 
chapter of Luke's Gospel, that the two are apt, by the 
merely superficial reader, to be considered as identical. 
But when we examine the circumstances in connection 
with which each was spoken, and the lessons which 
each was designed to teach, we find that they are quite 
distinct. That was uttered by the Lord as he was 
drawing nigh to Jerusalem, and before his triumphal 
entry into the Holj T City : this, on the Mount of Olives, 
three days after his public procession to the Temple. 
That was addressed to the promiscuous multitude : this 
was meant more particularly for the twelve. In that, 
the same sum of one pound is given to each servant : 
in this, one receives five talents, another two, and 
another one. That illustrates different degrees of im- 
provement of the same opportunity, with corresponding 
gradations of reward: this sets before us equal pro- 
portionate improvement of different opportunities, with 
equal proportionate reward. That was designed to 
correct the error of those who were looking for the 
immediate coming of the kingdom of God: this was 
intended, in conjunction with the story of the ten vir- 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 181 

gins, to teach that the right attitude of the disciple of 
Jesus, toward his second coming, is one of combined 
readiness and activity ; while in both the episode of the 
unprofitable servant is meant to warn us all of the sug- 
gestive fact, that talents unused are as really wasted as 
if they had been flagrantly abused. 

Thus distinct from the parable of the pounds, that 
of the talents is the needful complement to the story of 
the virgins. The Lord Jesus was as far as possible 
from being one-sided in his teachings ; and when he in- 
sisted strongly on any particular quality, he took care 
always to guard his hearers from supposing that noth- 
ing else "was needed. When he urged them to action, 
he supplemented his precept with something which 
reminded them of the importance of devotion ; and 
when he spoke of the necessity of attending to inward 
character, he combined with that a strong enforcement 
of outward exertion. So we find, that immediately 
after the parable of the virgins, which taught the lesson 
of watchfulness, we have this of the talents, which 
emphasizes the duty of work He does not mean, how- 
ever, that we should alternate vigilance with activity, 
but rather that the two should be combined, as in the 
case of the wall-builders of old, concerning whom 
Nehemiah writes : " The builders every one had his 
sword girded by his side, and so builded ; and he that 
sounded the trumpet was by me." 1 Our watchfulness for 
Christ's coming is not to degenerate into idleness ; but 
while we watch, we are to work, each in his allotted 
sphere, with the talents wherewith he has been in- 
trusted. 

How necessary that caution is, we may see illus- 
trated in the case of the Thessalonians, who, misun- 

i Neh. iv. 18. 



182 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

derstanding Paul's references to the second advent of 
the Lord so much as to believe that it was just at hand, 
gave up their ordinary occupations, thereby causing 
great disorder, and reducing themselves to dependence 
on the charity of others for their daily food. Similar 
things have been witnessed also in times greatly nearer 
our own. among Adventists and others: and. therefore, 
we cannot but admire the prophetic foresight of the 
Lord, in that, when he himself refers to his second com- 
ing, he bids his followers not only watch in readiness 
for it, but work in earnestness toward it ; or, as Trench 
has excellently put it, "While the virgins are repre- 
sented as waiting for their Lord, we have here the ser- 
vants working for him ; there the inward life of the 
faithful was described, here his external activity. . . . 
That parable enforced the need of keeping the heart 
with all diligence : this, of giving all diligence also in 
our outward service if we would be found of Christ in 
peace at the day of his appearing." 1 

The story itself is true to the Oriental life of the 
period ; for, when a wealthy man was leaving his home 
for a while, two courses were open to him for the 
arrangement of his affairs. Either he might make his 
confidential slaves his agents, committing to them the 
tilling of his land, and giving to them his money to be 
used by them in trade : or he might take advantage of 
the money-changing and money-lending system which 
had been introduced by the Phoenicians, and which was 
at the time in full operation throughout the Roman 
Empire. In the present case the lord adopted the 
former of these courses : and there was at least a tacit 
understanding, if no formal contract, that the servants 
would be rewarded for their fidelity. 

i Nores on the Parables, p. 262. 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 183 

This being the state of the case, the main lines of 
interpretation are not difficult to discover. The master 
is the Lord Jesus Christ. The servants are, in the first 
instance, the twelve to whom the parable was originally 
addressed ; but, in a broader sense, the members of the 
visible Church. The talents are primarily, perhaps, the 
gifts received for his followers, and dispensed to them, 
by the ascended Christ ; but we may view them in a 
more extended light as the opportunities of service 
which Christ has given to all who come into contact 
with his word. The going-away of the lord into a far 
country is the withdrawal of Christ as a visible pres- 
ence from the earth; and the return of the lord, "after 
a long time," is the second coming of Christ, when the 
final reckoning of judgment shall be held. The trad- 
ing of the servants with the talents is the faithful use 
made by his professed disciples, of the opportunities of 
service which Christ has given them ; while the treat- 
ment of the servants by their master on his return sets 
before us the principles on which the awards of the 
Judge of all the earth shall ultimately be made. 

I. Now, with, these outlines before us, we may be 
able, under their guidance, to bring out some of the 
most suggestive features of the teaching of the parable. 
First of all, we have here an explanation of the diver- 
sity which exists between individuals in the matter of 
opportunity of service in the cause of the Redeemer. 
We ail observe the fact that there is such a diversity. 
Some have received five talents, some two, and some 
only one ; and at first, some dissatisfaction m&y be felt 
with what looks like inequality in the distribution. 
But here is the account of the matter : "to every man 
according to his several ability." The talents, there- 



184 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

fore, do not denote the original endowments and quali- 
ties which men bring into the world with them, or the 
possessions into which they come by right of birth. 
No doubt, these also are gifts of God, which ought to 
be held and used by men as stewards of his " manifold 
bounties." But it is evident that the reference here is 
not to these. It is rather to those opportunities which 
have been given to men in consequence of their abilities 
and environment. In his bestowment of spiritual oppor- 
tunities, Christ has regard both to the natural abilities 
and providential surroundings of each man: and as, in 
the sovereignty of God, there is diversity in the latter, 
so, in the gracious administration of Christ, there is 
similar diversity in the former. No man has more 
opportunities of service than he can avail himself of to 
the full, and every man has just as many as he can use 
with advantage. When this principle is clearly under- 
stood, it takes away all ground for pride in those who 
have received five talents, and all cause for discontent 
in those who have obtained but one. Jealousy has no 
place here. Each has precisely what is fitted to his 
ability and circumstances, — no more, no less. From 
him who has received more talents, the full improve- 
ment of all he has will be required ; but he to whom 
fewer have been given will be held responsible only for 
those that have been conferred upon him. If Christ 
has given you only one talent, it is because he sees that 
at present you could not handle more. If he has given 
you five, it is because he sees that you are competent 
to deal even with them. As Trench has said, " The 
natural is the ground upon which the spiritual is super- 
induced ; and grace does not dissolve the groundwork 
of the individual character, nor abolish all its peculiari- 
ties, nor bring all that are subject to it to a common 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 185 

standard. The natural gifts are as the vessel, which 
may be large, or may be small, and which receives 
according to its capacity, but which in each case is 
filled ; so that we are not to think of him who had 
received the two talents as incompletely furnished, in 
comparison with him that had received the five, any 
more than we should affirm a small circle incomplete, 
as compared with a large." * Observe, each vessel is 
filled ; and therefore there is no room for jealousy 
between different individuals, or for dissatisfaction with 
our several opportunities, for each is endowed up to the 
measure of ability to use that which he has received. 
The man with the one talent may not be able, will not 
be able, to fill so wide a sphere as he who has five ; but 
he can fill his oivn sphere, and that is all that will be 
required at his hand. 

Now, it is of great importance that we should remem- 
ber this principle ; for there are few things that so 
paralyze the energy of the soul as, on the one hand, 
pride because our sphere is so large, and, on the other, 
discontent because it is so limited. The practical result 
of both is uselessness, by reason of unfaithfulness. 
How important, therefore, that we should learn the 
lesson which this expression of the parable teaches, and 
which the poet has put into the following lines ! — 

* Be sober, then, be vigilant; forbear 
To seek or covet aught beyond thy sphere : 
Only be strong to labor, and allow 
Thy Master's will to appoint the where and how. 
Serve God ; and winter's cold or summer's heat, 
The breezy mountain or the dusty street, 
Scene, season, circumstance, alike shall be 
His welcome messengers of joy to thee; 
His kingdom is within thee ! Rise, and prove 
A present earnest of the bliss above." 

1 Notes on the Parables, pp. 267, 268. 



186 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

II. But another suggestive thought in this parable is, 
that new opportunities come to us with our improve- 
ment of those which we already have. The first servant 
said, " I have gained five talents more ; " and the second 
exclaimed, "I have gained two other talents besides 
them." By utilizing what we have, we get what we 
have not. By doing what we can, we attain ability to 
do that which was originally impossible to us. The 
world is familiar with this law in the matter of money- 
making. The foundations of colossal fortunes have 
been laid in the taking advantage at first of little 
opportunities. One of our religious weeklies lately 
had a series of brief articles entitled, "Willing to 
Shovel," which showed how men who ultimately became 
millionnaires began with the earning of a few cents by 
doing such work as cleaning the snow from the sidewalks, 
or sawing wood in the cellar. But the same thing holds 
in public life. Take such a career as that of either of 
our two martyr Presidents, and you will see how, when 
the one talent is utilized, it ultimately increases into 
ten. There is a difference between the boy on the tow- 
line of the canal, and the statesman in the Senate, or 
the President in the White House ; and it was all the 
result of his using to the full opportunities just as they 
came. - 

But the principle holds true also in the spiritual 
department. A young man in a church begins to take 
an interest in Sunday-school work. This draws the 
attention of some of its members to him. He is asked 
by one of them to make an address at some social gath- 
ering. He does it so admirably, that, though he is only a 
grocer's apprentice, his pastor and some friends go home 
saying, " That youth is admirably fitted for the minis- 
try of the gospel." The matter is put before him : he 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 187 

expresses his willingness to do any thing for which God 
may open the way. Arrangements are made for his 
education ; he enters on the work of the pastorate : 
and, after years of service in smaller spheres, he finishes 
his life as the minister of one of the largest and most 
important churches in the metropolis of the land. That 
was the career of Alexander Raleigh, — one of the most 
eloquent preachers whom London has heard in the 
present generation. But there have been scores, I had 
almost said hundreds, like it, where even the one talent 
has become ten, and multitudes more where the two 
have become four. The true method of increasing 
our sphere is to fill to overflowing that in which we are. 
The horizon will widen as we climb the hill. Only, to 
secure that widening, we must keep walking up. This 
is the principle of Christ's administration of the kingdom 
of God ; and wherever you go, you will find illustri- 
ous examples of its operation. Even now, therefore, 
it is true that " to him that hath, shall more be given ; " 
and we have in this the foretaste and earnest of the 
awards of the judgment at the last. For, when he who 
has made the* five talents ten lays down his work at the 
Master's feet, the response of the Lord is, " Thou hast 
been faithful over a few things : I will make thee ruler 
over many things ; enter thou into the joy of thy 
Lord." So heaven shall give new opportunities of 
service to them who have made the most faithful use 
of those of earth. As much as the ten talents are 
superior to the five on earth, so much will the " many 
things " of heaven be superior to the " few things " of 
earth. So much, — nay, ineffably more. The reward 
of heaven is thus a wider sphere of service than earth 
could furnish, without the weariness which is here the 
consequence of labor, and with a fuller fellowship in 



188 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR 

that joy which Christ has in the doing of the Father's 
will. What the nature of the service shall be, we can- 
not tell, any more than we can rightly image to our- 
selves the intensity of the joy ; but there is the principle, 
and it is all the more assured to us by the fact that we 
see it in operation here and now. The kingdom is one 
in heaven and on earth, and the law for both of "these 
stages is the same. Faithful service widens opportu- 
nity. That is the seed-thought in this part of the 
parable. Will you act upon it now, that your life on 
earth may increase in usefulness, and your experience 
in heaven may be one of exalted, joyful, and laborious 
honor ? 

III. But now we come to the darker side of the 
picture, which tells us what must be the result of neg- 
lecting our opportunities ; for it is time that we should 
look at the conduct and doom of the unprofitable 
servant. 

Here let us observe, first, what is said concerning 
the man with the one talent. It is not alleged that he 
had wasted his Master's goods, like the unjust steward, 
or that he had spent the talent in riotous living, as the 
prodigal did his portion ; but only that " he went and 
hid the talent in the earth." He simply did nothing 
with it. Now, that means that he "neglected" his 
opportunities. He did not lead a scandalously wicked 
life ; yet he took no care to improve the openings for 
the service of God and his generation which were put 
before him, but passed them by as if he had never seen 
them. Not the doing of positive wrong, but the neg- 
lect to do that which God has given us the means of 
doing; not the commission of grievous sin, but the 
leaving undone of that which we have the ability and 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 189 

opportunity to do, is what here is charged, on his own 
confession, on this slothful servant. And, indeed, that 
is serious enough ; for to do nothing at all, when we 
can do much, is the most heartless way, often, of doing 
wrong. Life, like money, ought to be made productive ; 
and the interest to which it is to be put is that of ear- 
nest and laborious exertion in the service of Christ, not 
only for the upbuilding of our own characters, as the 
parable of the virgins enforced, but also for the benefit 
of our fellow-men, as that of the talents has specially 
emphasized. Life, like seed, is to be sown, not hoarded ; 
and the field in which we are to sow it is human hearts, 
our own, and those of our neighbors. When we put the 
matter in this way, we see how easy it is for one to lose 
one's life by no positive iniquity, but simply by neglect; 
and so the warning that we should not allow our great 
and golden opportunities to slip by us unimproved be- 
comes all-important. To this end, let us daily endeavor 
to make ourselves and the world better by laying our- 
selves out for the service of the Lord Jesus, and seeking 
to do every thing in his name. Even a heathen emperor 
was accustomed to say, " To-day I have lost a clay," 
when, in the evening, he could not point to any thing 
which he had that day done for the welfare of his race ; 
and, in the Christian sense of the word, that is a lost 
life, no matter how blameless otherwise it may seem to 
be, in which the man's own salvation has been neglected, 
and the service of " his generation by the will of God" 
ignored. 

But the case of this wicked servant has some other 
features of special interest for us. Thus it is notice- 
able, that he was the man who had received the one 
talent. It is not said, indeed, that he hid it in the 
earth because it was only one ; and I do not desire to 



190 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

impute motives to him. Neither do I wish to produce 
upon you the impression that only they who have very 
limited spheres are in danger of neglecting their oppor- 
tunities ; for that is far from being the case, and many 
of those who have received five talents are guilty of 
failing to improve them. But yet, it is true that many 
are content to do nothing because they cannot do 
"some great thing." They think that if they were 
only in other and better circumstances, they would 
exert themselves to purpose, for then it would be worth 
the while ; but now, they say, " We have no influence. 
If we had only the abilities of such an one, or the 
wealth of such another, or the position of such a third, 
we might do something ; but as it is, it is useless to 
attempt to do any thing," and they do nothing. Now, 
in answer to all such excuses, we have to say, first, as 
we have said before, that we- are not accountable for 
what we have not, but only for what we have ; and, 
second, that if a man neglects the work that is lying at 
his hands now. however lowly that may be, he would 
equally neglect the opportunities of a wider sphere if 
he were put into such a position. He who buried the 
one talent wonld have buried the five if he had received 
them ; for, though the smallness of the trust may have 
aggravated him, the reason of its doing so, as, indeed, 
also of his failure to employ it, was in his character, and 
not in its littleness. " He that is faithful in that which 
is least is faithful also in much, and he that is unjust 
in the least is unjust also in much." 

Again, it is exceedingly significant, that this servant 
alleges in excuse of his conduct, that he knew that his 
master was " an austere man, reaping where he had 
not sowed, and gathering where he had not strewed." 
And those who neglect God's service do so because 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 191 

they cherish wrong views of God himself. They are 
afraid of him as an exacting task-master, and therefore 
they try to do as little for him as possible ; whereas, if 
they only loved him as the God and Father of our Lord 
Jesus Christ, who gave his Son that we might be re- 
deemed, they would feel that no service which they 
could render would be adequate to express their grati- 
tude. As Dr. Dods has said, 1 " All wrongness of con- 
duct is at bottom based on a wrong view of God. 
Nothing so conduces to right action as right thoughts 
about God. If we think, with this servant, that God 
is hard, grudging to give and greedy to get, taking 
note of all shortcomings, but making no acknowledg- 
ment of sincere service, exacting the utmost farthing, 
and making no abatement or allowance ; if we one way 
or other virtually come to think that God never really 
delights in our efforts after good, and that whatever 
we attempt in our life he will coldly weigh and scorn, 
— then manifestly we shall have no heart to labor for 
him." 

Now, concerning this view of God's character, two 
things have to be said. In the first place, even if it 
were true, those who hold it are acting with egregious 
inconsistency when they let the opportunities of life 
pass unimproved ; since, the more rigorous God is, the 
more sure he will be to take notice of and punish their 
unfaithfulness. That is the answer made by his lord 
to the insinuation of the servant here, and so out of 
his own mouth he was condemned. But, in the second 
place, it is not true that God is thus austere and hard. 
He "doth not exact day labor, light denied." He 
does not require from any one an account of that which 
he has not received or cannot use. Neither does he 

1 The Parables of our Lord, p. 261. 



192 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

deal with men after the fashion of a tyrant. He is a 
loving Father, if only they will let him love them. 
His law is such that in the keeping of it they may find 
their highest good ; and his gospel is all love together, 
— love in its source, love in its manifestation, love in 
its effects : so that it is a libel alike on his character and 
revelation to call him " austere." But if men so think 
of him. they cannot but neglect their opportunities ; for 
so to think of him, is to become a slave crouching in 
blind terror before him, and altogether set against his 
service, instead of a son delighting in his affection. 
Here is the heart of the whole matter. So long as a man 
has this estimate of God, he wall imagine that his sphere 
is smaller than it ought to be, and his life will become 
aimless and indefinite, without any concentration of pur- 
pose or any energy of activity. But if, through faith 
in Jesus Christ, we accept God as our Father, who has 
forgiven our sins at the cost of the great sacrifice on 
Calvary, and who is following us continually with his 
love, we shall be led to offer him the homage of our 
hearts ; and our lives, catching the fervor of our spirits, 
will sphere themselves into unity and completeness, and 
find their chosen orbit in rotating around him as their 
centre of attraction. We will say, like Paul, u The love 
of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if 
one died for all, then these all died ; and that he died 
for all, that we who live should not henceforth live 
unto ourselves, but unto him who died for us and rose 
again." ■ Wondrous paradox, yet suggestive truth ! the 
fear of God as an "austere " One makes us needle— :f 
his service ; but the love of God as our Father and our 
Friend, through Christ, inspires us with devotion to him- 
self, and impels us to become his earnest servants. Le: 

i 2 Cor. y. 14, 15. 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 193 

us, therefore, seek this " spirit of adoption," and shut our 
ears to all such misrepresentations of Jehovah as this 
servant made. There be many in these days, young 
men, who would caricature God to you, and endeavor 
to persuade you that he is " an infinite tyrant," only 
that they may set you against him, and prevail upon 
you to repudiate your allegiance unto him. But believe 
them not. His name and nature is Love. His gospel 
is a revelation of mercy. His reign is one of justice, 
and in the cross of his Son all these attributes are seen 
in blended harmony, working together for the salvation 
of men. " Gracious is the Lord, and righteous ; yea, 
our God is merciful." " God so loved the world, that 
he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth 
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life." 
Keep these truths before your minds. Lay them up in 
the memories of your hearts ; and the more you realize 
their meaning, the less likely will you be to yield to the 
enticements of those who would gild sin with a plating 
of respectability by representing it as a revolt for lib- 
erty against the tyranny of God. Ah! there are no 
more hapless slaves than those who are thus " lords of 
themselves, that heritage of woe ; " and that is perfect 
freedom which lovingly accepts the service of God. 

IV. But we must look now, for a moment or two, at 
the sentence pronounced on this unprofitable servant. 
" Take the talent from him ; " that is, let his opportuni- 
ties forever cease. Here is a clear end of probation. 
" And give it to him who hath ten talents ; " that is, 
the opportunities forfeited by him will be added to 
those gained by the faithful. How that is to be done, 
we cannot tell; and yet we have, even in this life, a 
clear analogy to what is here implied, in the fact that 



194 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the duties which have been neglected by a servant who 
is dismissed are turned over to be performed by one 
who has been already proved to be trustworthy, to the 
increase at once of his honor and emolument. " Capa- 
city is extirpated by disuse," l while its diligent exercise 
enlarges and ennobles it. That is the law here ; and, so 
far as we may judge from this parable, it will be the law 
at the final judgment, and will determine the ultimate 
destiny of each. But this is not all. "Cast ye the 
unprofitable servant into outer darkness : there shall be 
weeping, and gnashing of teeth." Who among us can 
contemplate such a doom without emotion? — "dark- 
ness," where no ray of God's countenance ever pene- 
trates ; "darkness " unrelieved, unmitigated, and eternal ; 
" outer darkness," away from the abode of God and of 
the holy ; " outer darkness," made more miserable by the 
wailing of those who now unavailingly upbraid them- 
selves for their folly and their selfishness. And this is 
to be the end of burying our talent by neglecting our 
opportunities. Oh, let us be warned in time ! for the 
warning here is given in love, in order that we may be 
kept from continuing in that course which must have 
this dreadful result. Never but once, during his abode 
on the earth, did our Lord blast any created thing ; and 
that was when he came to the fig-tree, looking for fruit, 
and found thereon " nothing but leaves." He did not 
blight it into perpetual barrenness because it produced 
wild fruit, or because it bore poisonous figs, but because 
he found on it " nothing but leaves ; " and so the curse 
of an eternal withering shall fall at last upon the soul 
which has done nothing with its opportunities upon the 
earth. 

1 Horace Bushnell. 



THE INTRUSTED TALENTS. 195 

" Ah ! who shall thus the Master meet, 
And before his awful judgment-seat 
Lay down for golden sheaves 
Nothing but leaves ? " 

Let us not, I beseech you, be found at last in this great 
condemnation. And, that we may guard against it, let 
us begin now to cry, like Paul, " Lord, what wilt thou 
have me to do ? " that like him also we may fill our 
lives brimful with that ministry of love and self-sacrifice 
which shall be crowned at last with the Divine com- 
mendation, "Well done, good and faithful servant: thou 
hast been faithful over a few things, I will make thee 
ruler over many things ; enter thou into the joy of thy 
Lord." 



196 THE PABABLES OE OUB SAVIOUR 



XIII. 
THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 

(Mark ir. 26-29., 

This parable is recorded by Mark alone. It is the 
only one thai is thus peculiar to him. He gives, in all, 
but four of the Lord's parables. Of thes^. fare axe 
be found also both in Matthew and Luke, and one in 
Matthew. This alone has a place only in his narrative. 
For that reason, some have attempted to show that 
have in this also only a modification of some other para- 
ble, such as that of the tares ; but my conviction is, 
that all who study it with candor and attention will 
agree with Xeander 1 when he says that it "bears the 
undeniable stamp of originality, both in its matter and 
form/" 

It is distinct from all the others: and yet its very 
position here indicates that it is to be regarded as sup- 
plementary to that of the sower, and was lesigned :: 
complete the history of the growth of the good seed 
which fell on the good ground. As you will remember, 
the object of the parable of the sower, so-called, vr;.~ tc 
illustrate the truth that the fate of the seed after it has 
been sown depends on the nature of the soil. You 
cannot have forgotten, also, that it gives a minute 
account of what happened in the cases of that which 
fell by the wayside, of that which fell on a thin layer 

1 Life of Christ, Bolin's translation, p. 346. 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 197 

of earth just above a rock, and of that which fell among 
thorns. But no such details are furnished concerning 
that which fell on good ground. We are simply told 
that "it brought forth fruit, some an hundred-fold, 
some sixty-fold, and some thirty-fold." Thus the only 
points to which attention is directed by it are, that, in 
the good ground, the seed was productive, though not 
all equally productive. But no incidents, like the 
devouring by birds of that which fell by the wayside, 
or the rapid springing-up and after withering of that 
which fell on rocky soil, or the being choked by the 
overgrowth of other things, as was the case with that 
which fell among thorns, are specified in regard to the 
germination of the seed on the fourth kind of soil. 
Here, however, in this parable which Mark alone has 
preserved, the full story of the growth of the seed on 
the good ground, so far as man can see it, or has any 
thing to do with it, is told. That which the parable of 
the sower merely summarizes, this one minutely de- 
scribes. It may, therefore, be regarded as a kind of 
appendix to the parable of the sower, supplementing 
what, as to the good ground, had been left vague and 
indistinct therein. 

But we shall come at the particular teaching of this 
beautiful allegory, if we enumerate with care these fol- 
lowing things ; namely, the facts which it presupposes, 
the truths which it illustrates, and the lessons which it 
enforces. 

I. Let us attend, first, to the facts which it presup- 
poses. It is implied very clearly, then, that the seed 
used is good seed. The germinating principle exists 
not in wholesome grain alone. The tares spring up, and 
bring forth fruit, as well as the wheat ; the berry of the 



198 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

deadly nightshade, as well as the acorn of the oak ; the 
seed of the poisonous hemlock, as well as the shoot of 
the vine. Even so an evil word spoken, or a dark sug- 
gestion insinuated, or a false doctrine inculcated, will 
produce fruits after its own kind, as surely as the truth 
will reproduce itself, and bring forth results of right- 
eousness and peace. But in this case, the sower used 
good seed, even that which is described by Christ in his 
comprehensive interpretation of the first of his parables, 
u The seed is the word of God.' r 

It is implied, again, in the allegory before us, that 
this good seed was sown. '• So is the kingdom of God, 
as if a man should cast seed into the ground." Weeds 
propagate themselves. They produce their seeds, and 
the winds of heaven may scatter them abroad, or the 
fowls of the air may carry them hither and thither ; or 
the happy schoolboy, laughing the while at the fancy 
that he can tell the hour thereby, may blow them with 
his breath : and wherever they fall, if there be soil, they 
grow. But grain must be cultivated. It will not thus 
sow itself. The law regarding all the cereals is, that 
they must be sown and gathered in by men. Now. is 
not the analogy here most suggestive ? Is it not true 
also in the spiritual department, that weeds sow them- 
selves? There needs no labor to fill the heart of a 
child with disobedience, selfishness, or impurity. All 
you have to do is to leave him alone. The moral 
atmosphere, around him is laden with germs of iniquity; 
and there is, alas ! within him only too kindly a soil for 
the reception of such things, so that they are sure to 
spring up there in luxuriant abundance. And what is 
true of a single soul is equally so of a neighborhood, a 
nation, and the human race as a whole. It is in vain 
here that we trust to nature alone. "We can reclaim 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 199 

waste places only by reducing them to cultivation, and 
sowing in them seed that shall by and by wave with 
harvests of precious grain ; and we can secure the ele- 
vation of the depraved in our city streets, the evangeli- 
zation of our nation, and the conversion of the world, 
only by diffusing the gospel of the grace of God. "For 
whosoever shall call on the name of the Lord shall be 
saved. How then shall they call on him in whom they 
have not believed ? and how shall they believe in him 
of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear 
without a preacher ? and how shall they preach except 
they be sent ? " l 

Once more, it is implied in this parable, that the seed 
fell on good ground, into which it found an entrance. 
As I have already hinted, the difference between this 
allegory and that of the sower is, that, in the case 
before us, the seed has all fallen into good ground, 
whereas, in the other, that could be said of only one 
portion. That which alighted on the wayside never 
got into the soil at all ; that which fell among thorns got 
into uncongenial and pre-occupied soil, and that which 
fell upon the rocky ground had no deepness of earth. 
But here not only was the good seed sown, but it fell 
into favorable soil ; and so it grew without interruption. 
You have heard of the wheat that was found in the 
case of an Egyptian mummy. For many centuries it 
had lain there without growing, for it had not there 
those circumstances which are indispensable to growth. 
But when it was taken, and put into the soil where it 
could have the influences of the earth and heat and 
light and moisture, it very soon sprung up, and brought 
forth many-fold. Now, in the same way, the word of 
God will not grow in a heart unless it be by that heart 

1 Rom. x. 13-15. 



200 THE PARABLE S OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

received. So long as it is outside of the heart, it takes 
no root in the man. It must be held, not by the cold 
mummy grasp of a dead hand, but by the warm, earnest 
embrace of a living and believing heart ; and then it 
will spring up. To no purpose, therefore, do we look 
for the fruit of truth in the soul, until it is believed. 
We may hear it. we may examine it. we may reason 
about it. we may even enjoy the excitement of contro- 
versy about it ; but until we believe it, we keep it still 
outside of us. and it cannot grow in us. This is why 
so many constant worshippers in our sanctuaries show 
no spiritual improvement from their sabbath privileges. 
They enjoy the accessories of the service ; they are 
pleased with the intellect or eloquence of the preacher : 
but they do not believe the truth that is presented to 
them ; and so •• the word preached doth not profit them, 
not being mixed with faith in the hearing of it.'' There 
can be no spiritual growth unless the word is believ- 
ingly received into the heart. What a man believes in, 
that he grows to be. If he believe in selfishness, he 
will become selfish : if he believe in pleasure, he will 
become a pleasure-seeker ; and if he believe in Christ, 
he will become Christ-like. The root of growth is 
faith. The seed will not spring up unless it finds a 
congenial soil. 

CD 

II. But. passing now to the consideration of the truths 
directly illustrated by this parable, it is pertinent to 
observe that it confines our attention to what goes on 
in the development of the seed between the time of its 
being sown and its being: harvested : and it tells us that 
all that lies between these two limits takes place accord- 
ing to laws, the operation of which is inscrutable to 
men, but the existence of which reveals itself in the 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 201 

uniform sequence of certain stages which are reached 
in the gradual evolution of the grain from its initial 
condition to maturity. Or, to put it in a more com- 
pact form, this parable treats simply and only of the 
growth of the seed, and sets before us these three 
things regarding it : namely, the mystery of the mode, 
the gradualness of the progress, and the definite and 
regular stages through which that progress passes. 

There is, first, the mystery of the mode. " It spring- 
eth up, he knoweth not how." No man can explain the 
growth of a grain of wheat. He may talk learnedly of 
many things connected with it, and may give them 
long, hard, and almost unpronounceable names ; but in 
the end, all his discourse leads virtually up to this : that 
God hath so fitted the seed to the soil, and the soil to 
the seed, that, when a corn of wheat falls into the earth, 
it springe th up. The husbandman can do many things 
to the soil. He can plough and harrow it ; he can 
enrich it with the addition of fertilizing substances ; he 
can prepare it for the reception of the seed. He can 
also choose the quality of the seed ; and, after it has 
sprung up, he can remove obstructions to its growth- 
that may have appeared in the shape of weeds. But 
he cannot make the seed to grow. It is not in his 
power to command at the right time the heat of the 
sun or the moisture of the clouds. He cannot order 
the process of germination. God has kept that in his 
own hands ; and the farmer very wisely leaves it with 
him, " and sleeps and rises, night and day," letting God 
work for him. 

Now, it is not otherwise in spiritual matters. The 
sower of truth cannot make it grow in the human heart, 
nor can he explain how it germinates there. He can 
only say that God hath so constituted the soul, that, 



202 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

when truth is received by it, it cannot lie dormant 
there, but must spring up and produce its appropriate 
effects. He may choose the kind of seed he shall em- 
ploy. He may vary his methods of instruction to suit 
the varied capacities of those whom he seeks at differ- 
ent times to teach ; and as the truth is springing up, 
he may be instrumental in removing error from associa- 
tion with it. But he cannot make it grow : the power to 
do that belongs to the Spirit of God alone. Xo man 
can command those spiritual influences which he has 
kept in his own hand. He worketh where, when, and 
how he pleaseth. We may pray for his baptism, but 
we cannot command it; and it was only impious pre- 
sumption which induced the leaders of the Salvation 
Army, a year or two ago in .England, to put down in 
the programme of one of their protracted meetings, for 
a certain day, at a certain hour, " Descent of the Holy 
Ghost," 

Neither can we call at will those providential dispen- 
sations, which, in *the culture of the heart, correspond 
to the changes of the weather in the growth of the 
crops. We cannot bring upon each other affliction or 
health, adversity or prosperity, sorrow or joy, bereave- 
ment or blessing, by the agency of which the growth 
of a holy character is so furthered in some men, and by 
the absence of which it is so hindered in others. All 
these things are out of our power. They are beyond 
our control. They come, we know not how. They are 
arranged by God according to his wisdom ; and as the 
pious husbandman, when he has sown his seed, leaves 
all the rest with God, so, after we have scattered the 
good seed of the Word, we ought to look up in faith 
and prayer to the Lord of the harvest, and wait 
patiently for the result. As the Apostle James has 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 203 

said, " Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious 
fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until 
he receive the early and the latter rain. Be ye also 
patient; stablish your hearts, for the coming of the 
Lord draweth nigh." 1 Neither ought we to allow 
the mystery which shrouds the mode of the Divine opera- 
tions to keep us from availing ourselves of their benefits. 
Men do not wait to understand every thing about 
meteorology before they take advantage of the winds 
to propel their ships, and we ought not to let the 
unfathomableness of the mystery of the mode of the 
working of God's Spirit in the human heart keep us 
from availing ourselves of his gracious agency. It is a 
problem not yet solved, how the light and heat of the 
sun are maintained; but we do not on that account 
refuse to accept these blessings, and utilize them. Let 
the same common-sense characterize our proceedings in 
spiritual things ; and the man who proclaims the truth 
will leave God to take care of its growth, while he who 
hears it and receives it will humbly and gratefully 
rejoice in its peace. 

But emphasis is put in this parable, also, on the 
gradualness of the growth of the seed. The processes 
of nature are for the most part gradual ; so much so, 
indeed, that at any one point you can scarcely detect 
that there is a difference from that which immediately 
preceded. Thus, if one were to lie down day by day 
beside a field of growing grain, he would not be able to 
mark distinctly the progress made in any one particu- 
lar hour. I question, indeed, if in such circumstances 
he would be able to tell when precisely the blade 
began to pass into the ear, or when the first yellow 
tinge began to make its appearance, and the ear began 

i Jas. v. 7, 8. 



204 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

to fill. The fact that there has been progress is appar- 
ent, but the growth itself has been so gradual as to be 
almost imperceptible. There are times, indeed, when 
there seems to be a great start taken. These are the 
fine " growing days " of which the farmer speaks, when, 
after refreshing rain, there comes genial warmth, and 
one thinks he can almost see the stalks pushing them- 
selves up. But, generally speaking, the growth from 
day to da}^ is all but imperceptible. 

Now, it is so also with the growth of a holy character 
in a man, from the up-springing of the good seed of the 
word in his heart. There are times, indeed, when it 
appears as if a great start were taken, and it develops 
more rapidly than at others. Such, for example, are 
seasons of trial and affliction, when, after the tears of 
genuine repentance, there comes the warmth of deep, 
fervent love to Christ. Oh, these are " growing days " 
indeed, and those who have passed through them can 
bear testimony to this fact. But commonly the growth 
from day to day is all but imperceptible, like that of 
the child at your feet who seems no bigger to-day than 
he was yesterday, and will appear no bigger to-morrow 
than he is to-day. " The path of the just is as the shin- 
ing light, that shine th. more and more unto the perfect 
day." There is progress, but it is not always easy to 
trace it from one day to another. By little and little, 
even as one color shades into another, a man becomes 
aggravated in sin ; and by little and little, even as the 
tide advances on the shore, one becomes eminent in 
holiness. That is not a plant which springs up in a 
man like the prophet's gourd in a single night. One 
does not vault into it by a single bound, but he grows 
into it through faith and prayer and obedience and 
patience ; yet, though the daily advances may be 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 205 

hardly discernible, the great out-standing stages are 
well defined. 

This brings me to the third thing emphasized in this 
parable ; namely, that, in the up-springing of the good 
seed into Christian character, there are distinct stages 
of development, — " first the blade, then the ear, then 
the full corn in the ear." . In growth, there are easily rec- 
ognizable landmarks, like the landing-places in a stair, 
which are perfectly distinguishable from what goes 
before and from what follows. Thus, in the fruit-tree 
we have the bud, the blossom, and the fruit; and in 
human life we have infancy, childhood, youth, and 
manhood. We may not be able to discover just when 
the one of these passes into the other, but we can rec- 
ognize each when we see it. Just so, in the Christian 
character, we have different stages indicated by differ- 
ent marks. One who has had any large experience in 
dealing with the disciples of Christ will ordinarily 
have no great difficulty in deciding whether a man be 
a recent convert, or a Christian of some standing, or a 
venerable and (as the old-fashioned phrase used to be) 
"well-exercised" believer. In the first you will com- 
monly find zeal predominant ; in the second, a certain 
censoriousness which is the shadow of knowledge ; and 
in the third, humility and love. In the first you will 
have a dash of intolerance ; in the second, a little cyni- 
cism ; and in the third, a broad and wide-embracing 
charity. Courage comes ordinarily before knowledge, 
and knowledge before patience ; while love comes to its 
maturity only in the ripened saint. Every one who 
has attended to the training of his own children knows 
that there are certain faults, or tendencies, or crude- 
nesses, which seem to belong to particular ages. 
Those special ages, indeed, have brought with them 



2 >: ~ PAEABLES OF OUR SAnOUB. 

some great acquirements that are valuable ; but along 

a law, certain characteristics which often give a parent 
trouble. With lis first-born, he is especially at a loss. 

Brr: :s :rle: : lil ir en : :~e ini: rle Line. le lis y:\~z. 
si-i-TLiTiriei r: rle rler-iner.! : ::r zr:^ rle eliesr lis 
left all such things behind, and therefore he "winks 
;:" rlerr in rle t: ringer :nes. Tni~Tirs TTrlenrlv rnrl 
rle~. roe. Live :ir.L:::~n rlem X:^r. i: .- ;isr sirnlir 
in rle I'lrislm lire. Tie ne~ : :n~err. ~_en ~e rieer 
such a one for the first time, is apt to be a little try- 
ing to us- He is all Ire, and sometimes he scorches 
us with his flame. The older Christian, too, who is 
the stage :: the end, or the unripe fruit, is apt to 
be mrirlesinre ~lrl lis : .:::;". It;:.:::-: ~r it rlese ere 
just the qualities attendant on the degree of growth 
at which he has arrived. Rightly looked at, they are 
the evidences of a new period of development; and 
Tie cesr rlinrr — -_ :;n i: — ::1 rleii is :: ie: rleni 
alone, and wait in patient love until :::t friends have 
gr:-^n re: :: rlenr. ^"e i^r: r.:r 1:1 ::: rle eir 
l:::e rle rliie. i:r ::t r_e rill rirenei err ~lei :: is 
rime :t1t ::: rle :: re: ::-._:: :: rle eir. 1 v.: ~e ire :: 
"re sirllei ~len ~- Irne rle e~lien:e cf rr:~l in 
rle iresenre :: s~i:l r lings is in ii lire rlir : ne~ siege 
Irs reei. reiil-r 1. 

m. NoW, if this be, as I believe it is, the true inter- 
pretation of this parable, we are in a position to get 
from it the lessons for our own practical life, which it 
so suggestively teaches. And among these, I place 
first the important truth, that all who are in any way 
engaged in sowing the good seed of the word of God 
should accompany their work with prayer. The sow- 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 207 

ing is our part : the making of the seed to grow is 
God's. Remember what Paul has said : " I have plant- 
ed, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So 
then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he 
that watereth, but God that giveth the increase." * This 
may teach us humility, but it will also lead us to entire 
dependence upon God. Whether, therefore, we be 
parents, or teachers, or preachers, let us accompany 
our sowing with prayer, that God may keep us from 
laboring in vain, and crown our efforts with an abun- 
dant harvest. 

But, as a second lesson from this parable, I urge that 
we should not look for ripeness before it is due. 
Growth takes time, and it follows its own laws. We 
ought not, therefore, to look for certain qualities of 
character too soon, or out of their due and proper 
course. You cannot have the ear before the blade, nor 
the ripe harvest just when the ear appears. You must 
not expect the boy to be as sedate and solid as the man, 
neither should you look in the young convert for those 
qualities of character which can come only as the 
results of long experience. Many parents do great in- 
jury to their children, by expecting certain excellences 
in them too soon. I always pity the first-born of a 
family, or an only child, just on that account ; for his 
seniors are not willing to let him be long enough a 
child, and almost always forget the proverb that " 3-011 
cannot have an old head on young shoulders." But 
I fear that similar injury is sometimes inflicted, in a sim- 
ilar way, on young Christians. Sufficient allowance is 
not always made by those of riper experience, for the 
crudeness and immaturity which are inseparable from 
that stage of development at which they have arrived. 

1 1 Cor. iii. 6, 7. 



208 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Burns once complainingly said to his brother Gilbert, 
" Man, you're no' for young folk ; " meaning, thereby, 
that he did not sufficiently understand and make allow- 
ance for the peculiarities of youth. And, similarly, there 
are many Christians to whom it may be said that they 
are not for young Christians. We must not insist 
upon it, that they should be in every respect like those 
who have been long in Christ. But we ought to mod- 
erate our expectations, and be content to wait for the 
growth which requires time for its development. And 
this rule must work both ways, so that the young 
Christian is not to judge the older harshly because of 
his apparent lack of effervescing emotion. Let us be 
charitable toward each other. The young convert 
must not expect that the aged believer is to be like 
him, any more than the aged believer is to insist that 
the young convert must in all respects resemble him. 
The blade will be the ripened ear by and by. It is on 
the way thereto. Give it time, and God will give it 
ripeness. 

Finally, let all Christian workers look forward with 
hopefulness to the coming harvest ; for there is nothing 
in which we can engage that will yield a richer increase 
than the sowing of the good seed of the word of God. 
The Lord is not stinted in his blessings. We sow in 
single grains, we reap full ears ; we sow in handfuls, 
we reap in bosomfuls ; we sow in days and years, we 
reap eternity. There is joy in sowing, there is a deeper 
joy in seeing the seed springing up : but the richest joy 
of all is that of harvest-home. It is a gladsome thing 
to preach the word of life, even though sometimes one 
may preach it in tears ; there is a yet more inspiriting 
joy in seeing that word take root in human hearts, and 
bring forth the fruit of holy living : but the most thrill- 



THE GROWTH OF THE SEED. 209 

ing joy of all is that of the heavenly ingathering, when 
the servants of the Lord shall come to him with rejoi- 
cing, "bringing their sheaves with them." My hearer, 
shall that bliss be yours ? 

Of one thing we may be sure : a harvest of some sort 
there will be, for we all are sowing now ; and, if we are 
sowing the wind, we shall reap at length the whirlwind. 
Either, therefore, our ingathering shall be of blessing, 
or it shall be like that described in such terrible lan- 
guage by the prophet : " Because thou hast forgotten 
the God of thy salvation, and hast not been mindful 
of the rock of thy strength, therefore shalt thou plant 
pleasant places, and shalt set it with strange slips. In 
the day shalt thou make thy plant to grow, and in the 
morning shalt thou make thy seed to flourish ; but the 
harvest shall be a heap in the day of grief and of des- 
perate sorrow." 1 There are but the two alternatives. 
" Be not deceived: God is not mocked; for whatsoever 
a man soweth, that shall he also reap. He that soweth 
to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption ; but he 
that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life 
everlasting." 2 

May God help us to lay these truths to heart. 

i Isa. xvii. 9, 10. 2 Gal. vi. 7, 8. 



210 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XIV. 

THE TWO DEBTORS. 

(Luke vzi. 36-50.) 

The parable to which we have now come is so insep- 
arable from the history in which it is embedded, that 
we can rightly interpret it only by entering fully into 
the details of that. But we need not regret this neces- 
sity, for the story is one of the most touching which 
even the word of God contains ; and we shall all be 
the better for coming once again into contact with " the 
heart of Christ," as it is here revealed. The expositor's 
only anxiety is, lest, by his handling of that which is 
so exquisite, he should leave the mark of his defiling 
touch upon its loveliness, — lest, by his very effort to 
explain its meaning, he should weaken the force of that 
which is in itself so effective. Still, even with such 
risks before him, it is important that he should carry 
on his work; for here, too, there are subtile suggestions 
and profound lessons which yield themselves only to 
patient investigation. 

The Lord had been invited to eat with one of the 
Pharisees, and had accepted the invitation. There is 
nothing in the narrative of Luke, — who alone records 
the incidents, — by which we are able to identify either 
the place in which this Pharisee resided, or the date at 
which this feast was given by him to Jesus. Neither 
can we recognize in the principal characters to whom 



THE TWO DEBTORS. 211 

we are here introduced, any one whom we meet with 
elsewhere in the Gospels. The Simon of this feast could 
not be the Simon of Bethany, and the woman of this 
anointing could not be Mary the sister of Lazarus. 
Only the most wilful and irrational determination to 
make a contradiction where there is really none could 
induce any one to persist in the assertion that the ban- 
quet here described is the same as that of which we 
have an account in the twelfth chapter of the Gospel 
by John. 

Neither is there any — the least — warrant for the 
idea that the woman of this history was Mary Magdalene. 
She is one of the unnamed females in these inspired 
histories ; and we are in full accord with Bishop Hall, 
when he writes thus regarding this matter : * — 

" I hear no name of either the city or the woman : 
she was too well known in her time. How much better 
is it to be obscure than infamous ! Herein I doubt not 
God meant to spare the reputation of a penitent con- 
vert. He who hates not the person, but the sin, cares 
only to mention the sin, not the person. It is justice to 
prosecute the vice : it is mercy to spare the offender. 
How injurious a presumption is it for any man to name 
her whom God would have concealed, and to cast this 
aspersion on those whom God hath noted for holiness ! " 

But now, how came Simon to invite Jesus to his 
house? He was a Pharisee, and as such belonged to 
that section of the Jews who were at this juncture 
beginning to show open antagonism to the Lord. All 
the Pharisees, however, were not equally bad. We 
cannot forget that Nicodemus was one of them; and 
this man, though he had not got so far as Nicodemus 
was when he recognized in Jesus a teacher sent from 

1 Contemplations, pp. 529, 530. 



212 THE PAB ALII 3 " _~ HUB SAVIOUR. 

heaven, had yet a certain respect for him as a rabbi, or 
religious instructor. He was interested in him, and 
thought it possible that he might be a prophet ; bnt he 
had not yet arrived at the conclusion that lie was. 
There was, therefore, beneath this invitation of the 
Lord at this time to his house, a wish to scrutinize him 
more closely, and so to obtain the means of coming to 
some definite decision regarding him. Hence, while he 
was glad enough to receive him, he did not show him 
any great honor. In fact, he dispensed with even the 
usual courtesies offered by a host to his guest, and 
treated the Saviour with a patronizing air, which 
seemed to say that it was distinction enough for Jesus 
to be at his table, and that he had no right to expect 
any further civilities. He had heard him, and had 
thereby had his curiosity aroused to find out more 
about him ; and so, as the best means of gratifying 
that, he asked him to dinner. But that was alL If 
there was any favor in the case, his view of the matter 
ws s, that it was he that conferred it by giving the 
invitation, and not Jesus by accepting it. 

And how came the Lord to accept of such an invita- 
tion ? Simply out of his great grace. He held himself 
aloof from no class of men. Now we find him the guest 
of Levi the publican, and again that of a Pharisee lite 
Simon ; but all the time he was the friend of sinners. It 
was part of his plan to accept hospitality wherever it was 
proffered to him, in order that he might thereby reach 
all classes and conditions of men. Therefore he did 
not decline the request of Simon, but went to his house, 
just, indeed, as he came to earth itself. 4i to seek and to 
t hat which was 1 : b t . " 

But now the guests are in their places, nt: sitti g 
cross-legged on the floor, lite modern Orientals, nor 



THE TWO DEBTORS. 213 

seated on chairs, as with ourselves ; but reclining, after 
the old Roman fashion, on couches, the head being 
toward the table, and the feet, unsandalled, stretched 
out behind, while the body rested on the left side and 
elbow. Around the walls of the room sit some of the 
inhabitants of the place, who have heard of the feast, 
and who have come in to see the banquet and to listen 
to the conversation. For on such occasions there is, 
even at this day, in Eastern society, much more latitude 
allowed than there is with us. Thus in one of the ear- 
liest, and still one of the best, of the books of Eastern 
travel, being the report of the party of which Andrew 
Bonar and Robert McCheyne were members, we find 
the following statement: u At dinner at the consul's 
house at Damietta, we were much interested in observ- 
ing a custom of the country. In the room where we 
were received, besides the divan on which we sat, there 
were seats all round the walls. Many came in, and took 
their places on these side seats, uninvited and yet 
unchallenged. They spoke to those at table, on busi- 
ness, or the news of the day ; and our host spoke freely 
to them." It is added, that they found the same cus- 
tom in existence in Jerusalem. So, in the case before 
us, the seats at the sides of the room were occupied by 
spectators, who had come in to be present at, though 
not to be partakers of, the feast. Among these was a 
woman of the city, a poor waif, who had been living on 
the wages of iniquity, and who bore upon her counte- 
nance the signs of her depravity. In a small town, 
everybody knows all about everybody else ; and so 
her appearance and reputation were familiar to all in 
the apartment. We may suppose, therefore, that her 
entrance caused some little flutter of sensation. But 
when, in a paroxysm of uncontrollable emotion, she 



214 THE PARABLES OE OUR 8AVIOUB. 

stood M at the feet of Jesus,*' and " began to wash them 
with her tears, and did wipe them with the hairs of her 
head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them " with 
ointment taken from an alabaster vase, we may be sure 
that her actions took the whole party by surprise. 
Indeed, they were properly understood only by the 
Lord himself: and they were so, first, because it is only 
love that can interpret love ; and, second, because Jesus 
alone was acquainted with the unrecorded history which 
lay between her sinful life and her so singular behavior 
at this banquet. It is only love that can interpret love ; 
and therefore that which seems unusual and extravagant 
to on-lookers is, between lovers themselves, only the 
ordinary language of affection. So it came, that Judas 
said, regarding the offering of Mary, " To what purpose 
is this waste ? " and so, in the every way similar instance 
of this woman, the unloving Simon viewed her conduct 
with displeasure. But Jesus knew better. His own 
love, which found its unusual expression in the cross, 
was at no loss to comprehend the meaning of this impas- 
sioned and devoted penitent. 

Besides, as I have said, there was an unrecorded 
history lying behind this manifestation. For the two 
must have met before. This was not the first time 
she had seen the Lord. Already she had heard his 
words, and been brought to her true self by their 
gracious influence. Perhaps she had been in the crowd 
when, but a short while before, he had given that 
loving invitation. " Come unto me, all ye that labor 
and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take 
my yoke upon you, and learn of me, for I am meek 
and lowly in heart ; and ye shall find rest unto your 
souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light,*' 
— words which we cannot read without the deepest 



THE TWO DEBTORS. 215 

emotion, but which, as they came from him, must 
have made their way straight to her heart. In any 
case, on some previous occasion, virtue had gone out of 
him to her, and had awakened new hope within her. 
She saw the possibility of being forgiven, even for her 
life of sin. She felt uprising within her the determina- 
tion to become a pure and noble woman. Nay, she 
had the persuasion that she was already pardoned and 
accepted hj God ; and so, unmoved by all surrounding 
discouragements, conscious of nothing but that He was 
there to whom she owed her new-born blessedness, she 
eagerly threw herself upon his feet, and took this 
method of telling him " all that was in her heart." She 
came thus to him, not as a penitent seeking pardon, but 
as a sinner already forgiven ; and so that which looked 
like extravagance to others was perfectly natural in her, 
and thoroughly acceptable to him. It was but " the 
return and repercussion " in her of that love which he 
had already shown to her. Her tears were, as Luther 
calls them, " heart-water ; " they were the distillation of 
her gratitude. She had not come, indeed, to weep : she 
had come designing to use the ointment only. But her 
tears had, as it were, stolen a march upon her : they 
had come unbidden and unexpected, and had rather 
interfered with the fulfilment of her purpose. But in 
order that her original intention might be thoroughly 
carried out, she wiped them from his feet with her flow- 
ing tresses, and then poured over him the precious 
ointment, whose odor filled the house. 

But Simon did not comprehend her in the least. He 
looked on in amazement, not unmingled with disgust. 
He knew the reputation of the woman ; but he knew 
nothing whatever of the change which had been wrought 
upon her, and he was surprised at the manner in which 



216 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Jesus received her attentions. Nor let us judge him 
too harshly; for there is something to be said for him, 
after all. He had a regard for morality ; he would not 
have spoken to such a character as he conceived this 
woman to be. But the misfortune was, that he judged 
entirely by appearances. He condemned her before he 
had possession of all the evidence. He knew that she 
had been a sinner, but he did not know that she was now 
a forgiven penitent. And, erring thus regarding the 
woman, he erred also of necessity regarding Christ ; for 
he said within himself, " This man, if he were a prophet, 
would have known what manner of woman this is that 
toucheth him ; for she is a sinner." He had desired to 
convince himself whether Jesus was a prophet or not, 
and now he had found it out ! He argued it out within 
himself after this fashion : u A prophet is a discern er of 
spirits, and a holy man ; now, if this man is a discerner 
of spirits, he must know the unholiness of this woman, 
and, as being himself holy, he would not let her touch 
him as he now does ; or if, knowing her character, he 
allows her thus to approach him, he must be himself 
unholy : and in either case he can be no prophet." But 
he spoke no word. All this was merely the thought of 
his heart. And he was shaken out of it by the excla- 
mation of the Lord, who showed him that he was a 
discerner of spirits after all, by answering the argument 
which he had not himself ventured to utter. " Simon ! " 
exclaimed he, "I have somewhat to say unto thee." 
And he said, " Master, say on." Then came the para- 
ble : " There was a certain creditor which had two debt- 
ors ; the one owed five hundred pence, and the other 
fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frankly 
forgave them both. Tell me, therefore, which of them 
will love him most." Simon answered either in a kind 



THE TWO DEBTORS. 217 

of supercilious tone, as if he thought the question of no 
importance ; or in a constrained manner, as if he felt 
that something was to be made out of his reply to his 
own disadvantage : " I suppose, that he to whom he 
forgave most." And Jesus said unto him, " Thou hast 
rightly judged." 

Now, the history over which we have come has fur- 
nished the key to the interpretation. The creditor is 
Christ, the two debtors are Simon and the woman. 
The debts are different, perhaps, objectively, in the 
magnitude of the sins of each, but rather, perhaps, sub- 
jectively, in the depth of the conviction of each. Both 
alike, however, are hopelessly bankrupt ; and to both 
alike frank forgiveness is offered. Now, presuming 
in both cases that the forgiveness is accepted, Simon 
was right in answering that he to whom he forgave 
most will love him most. It follows, therefore, that the 
love which this woman manifested in such an unusual 
way was the consequence of her acceptance of forgive- 
ness for unusual sin. She had been a great sinner, but 
she was now a forgiven sinner ; and the fact that she 
had been forgiven so much was the explanation of that 
demonstration of her affection which had so scandalized 
Simon. 

But if the acceptance of pardon by her is the expla- 
nation of her warmth, where shall we find that of the 
coldness of Simon ? Plainly, in this : that he had not 
accepted forgiveness, even for the fifty pence which he 
owed. That was the inference which the Lord designed 
his host to draw. But, as he seemed either unable or 
unwilling to draw it for himself, the Lord did it for him 
in an indirect but yet most forcible manner. Turning 
to the woman, he said to Simon, " Thou seest this woman. 
I entered into thine house, thou gavest me no water for 



218 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

my feet ; but she hath washed my feet with tears, and 
wiped them with the hairs of her head. Thou gavest 
me no kiss ; but this woman, since the time I came in, 
hath not ceased to kiss my feet. My head with oil 
thou didst not anoint, but this woman hath anointed 
my feet with ointment." What, then, — this is the sug- 
gested application, — is the inference from all this in 
the light of your answer to my question ? Clearly, that 
she has been forgiven much, and that thou hast not 
been forgiven at all. Her love is the result of Her 
acceptance of forgiveness ; and because she has been for- 
given much, it is that she loves so much : but your in- 
difference is an evidence that you have not yet accepted 
pardon, even for the smaller sins which you acknowledge 
you have committed. " Wherefore I say unto you, Her 
sins are forgiven." You can see that from her love ; 
and they must have been " many " sins, " for she loveth 
much." " But to whom little is forgiven, the same 
loveth little." 

Such is clearly the meaning of the parable in its 
application to Simon and the woman ; and, thus under- 
stood, we perceive at once that all the controversy 
which has been waged over it, as to the ground of for- 
giveness, is irrelevant. For the woman's love was the 
result and evidence of her having been forgiven, not the 
reason why she was forgiven. And so, when the Lord 
adds, turning to the woman the while, "Thy sins are 
forgiven, go into peace," he is not giving her then pardon 
for the first time, but rather formally expressing with 
absolute certainty, that of which already she had had 
the inward assurance. We may illustrate this from the 
case of her who was afflicted with the issue of blood. 
You remember how she came behind the Lord, and 



TEE TWO DEBTORS. 219 

touched him, saying within herself, " If I may but touch 
his clothes, I shall be whole ; " and straightway she felt 
in her body that she was whole of her plague : that 
corresponds to the first coming of this woman to Jesus, 
when she knew in herself that she was forgiven. After- 
ward, when she who had been cured heard him asking, 
" Who touched me ? " she came forward, and told him 
all that was in her heart: that corresponds to this 
woman's approach to Jesus here in the banquet-hall. 
Finally, when Jesus said to the woman whom he had 
already healed, "Daughter, thy faith hath made thee 
whole : go in peace, and be whole of thy plague," that 
corresponds to his expression here, "Thy sins are for- 
given [or, more literally, " have been forgiven "] thee, 
go into peace." The forgiveness in the latter case, like 
the cure in the former, had been already given and re- 
ceived ; but assurance was made doubly sure by the 
formal expression at the end of the interview. With 
a glad heart, therefore, this woman must have left the 
house of Simon. But the guests, seeing the plight in 
which their host was left, endeavored to shield him by 
raising a new issue ; for they said, " Who is this that 
forgiveth sins also ? " Their device, however, did not 
mar the graciousness of Christ ; for he simply met it 
by reiterating to the woman the assurance that she was 
freely pardoned, and by sending her away "into the 
peace of God, which passeth all understanding." 

Only one question now remains, and it is this : Does 
not the teaching of the Lord here encourage sinners to 
go to great lengths in iniquity, in order that at last, 
being forgiven much, they may love much? Now, as 
every one can see, that is but another form of the ob- 
jection to the doctrines of grace, as such, which Paul 
thus enunciates, " What shall we say, then ? Shall we 



220 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

continue in sin that grace may abound?" and we may 
meet it, as Paul meets it, by saying, " God forbid ! " 
But we may show its untenableness in another way. 
The aggravated sinner may be nearer the kingdom than 
the self-righteous Pharisee. Christ told his hearers once 
that the publicans and harlots would go into it before 
them. That is because it is much harder to part with 
righteous self than it is to give up sinful self. Yet that 
would be no valid reason for a man's giving himself up 
to gross iniquity ; and in like manner, when the Lord 
says, " to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little," 
he gives no countenance to those who would sin much 
in order to be forgiven much. Indeed, there is an in- 
consistency in the very conception ; for, how could one 
who sincerely desires forgiveness at all be willing to go 
further into sin ? 

But perhaps the true answer to the question is to be 
had in the idea at which I have already dimly hinted ; 
this, namely, that the debts here are not regarded objec- 
tively in the magnitude of the sins, but subjectively in 
the conviction of the sinner. And the fact that an 
offering almost identical with that brought by this 
woman to Jesus was made also by Mary of Bethany 
seems to tell in favor of this view of the case. The 
great sinner and the great saint touch hands in the act 
of anointing the Lord. 

" Man's hasty lip would both reprove, — 
One for the stain of too much sin, 
One for the waste of too much love; 
But both availed His smile to win," — 

because both offered sincerely. The one, in her new- 
born religious life, sees something of the enormity of 
her sinful career ; the other, in her growth in holiness, 



THE TWO DEBTORS. 221 

has learned to discover the vileness of siri, of whatsoever 
sort : and so, sisters in the love of Jesus, they, as it were, 
meet with their vases of ointment in his presence, both 
pardoned and both forgiven. There are aggravated sin- 
ners who have no deep sense of sin, and there are great 
saints who regard themselves as the chief of sinners. 
The measure of one's gratitude for forgiveness is the 
conception which he has of his sin. He who makes 
light of sin will make light also of salvation. But he 
who has a profound conviction of the evil of sin as the 
abominable thing which God hates, will have an over- 
whelming sense of God's love in granting him forgive- 
ness. The deeper our apprehension of the exceeding 
sinfulness of sin, the greater will be our love to Him 
who gives us deliverance from it. And where there 
is that sense of the hatefulness of sin, there will be no 
disposition to go deeper into it. 

I conclude with one or two inferences from this whole 
subject. 

1. Let sinners of every name and degree be encour- 
aged by this narrative to go at once to Christ. He will 
in no wise cast them out. There are no more touching 
stories in the Gospels than those which tell how Jesus 
dealt with the most degraded class of sinners. Recall 
his conversation with the woman of Samaria, at the well 
of Sychar. Bring up before you once again that scene 
in the temple, when the scribes and Pharisees dragged 
in before him the woman who had been taken in the 
very act of sin. Then read anew this narrative which 
has been before us to-night, and say if the prophecy 
regarding him was not true, " A bruised reed shall he 
not break, the smoking flax shall he not quench." A 
bruised reed was not deemed worthy of the shepherd's 
trouble when he was piping in the field ; and so he 



222 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

flung it away, and got another. Smoking flax gives an 
offensive odor ; and rather than be annoyed with it, the 
housewife will take it out of the lamp, and tread upon 
it. But it was otherwise with Jesus. That which 
others would cast away, he sought to retain, and turn 
to good account. That which others would give up as 
hopeless, he would not abandon. Though a man might 
seem to be as good-for-nothing as a bruised reed, he 
would receive him and restore him. Though a woman 
might be as repulsive as smoking flax, and the world 
would cast her out of society, and trample on her, he 
would deal gently with her, and fan the spark into a 
flame which would burn brightly for the illumination 
of others. Where men perceived no promise of success, 
and would have been tempted to give up the individual 
as hopeless, he would labor on until the reed which had 
given forth a note jangled and out of tune was restored 
to its original condition, and gave its own quota to the 
harmony of Jehovah's praise. Oh, what hope there is 
even for the most degraded sinner here ! " This man 
receiveth sinners." They said it in reproach, but it is 
still his brightest glory. Whosoever thou art, then, 
and whatsoever be thy guilt, make application unto 
him, for he will in no wise cast thee out. 

2. But, as a second inference from this whole subject, 
let us learn, that, if we would be successful in raising 
the fallen, and reclaiming the abandoned, we must be 
willing to " touch " them, and to be " touched " by 
them. In other words, we must come into warm, lov- 
ing, personal contact with them. What an uplift Christ 
gave to the soul of this poor woman, when he, the pure 
and holy, let her thus approach him ! And this was his 
way all through his ministry. When he would heal the 
leper, he did not stand afar off, and cry, " Keep at a 



THE TWO DEBTOR S. 223 

distance ! keep at a distance, for thou art unclean." 
Nay, but he did a new thing in Israel. He touched 
the leper, yet was he not himself thereby defiled ; for the 
purity within not only repelled the pollution, but com- 
municated itself to the poor victim. And with the 
healing of his body, what a thrill would vibrate through 
the leper's soul, as he said, " Here is one, and he the 
noblest of them all, who is not afraid to touch me " ! 
So in our measure, in dealing with the moral lepers of 
society, we must touch them if we would raise them. 
In that historic story which had so much to do with 
awakening the conscience of this country to the sin of 
slavery, you remember that Miss Ophelia could do 
nothing with the little colored incorrigible so long as 
she shrank from her touch as from a toad. Contact is 
needed if virtue is to go out of us. When the Lord 
wished to save the human race, he touched it by taking 
on him our nature, without our nature's pollution. So 
we must take the nature of the degraded, without its 
impurity, if we would help him. We must stoop to 
take him by the hand, or to let him grasp our hand, if 
we would lift him up. Those who are the greatest ele- 
vators of their fellows are not the haughty Simons who 
scowl upon the outcasts, but the loving disciples of 
Jesus, who go in among them, and try to understand 
them, and seek to show them tokens of affection. 
Society, ay, even the Christian Church itself, has been 
too long in learning this lesson : but we have fallen now 
on better times ; and many a noble woman and many 
an earnest man has gone down into the sinks of iniquity, 
unappalled by dangers, and unrepelled by unpleasant- 
ness, and has brought back priceless souls which shall 
shine forever in the diadem of Christ. Let us imbibe 
their spirit, and follow their example. If Jesus touched 



224 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

and received sinners, what right have we to stand aloof 
from them? He was without sin: but we — God help 
us! — we are sinners in his sight, not greatly different 
from them. Why, then, should we be so pharisaical? 
Oh ! as we read this narrative, let us learn the lesson of 
these simple lines, — 

u Deal kindly with the erring, 
Oh ! do not thou forget, 
However darkly stained by sin, 
He is thy brother yet. 

" Heir of the self-same heritage, 
Child of the self-same God. 
He hath but stumbled in the path 
Thou hast in weakness trod. 

" Deal kindly with the erring : 
Thou yet mayst lead him back, 
With holy words aud tones of love, 
From misery's erring track. 

" Forget not thou hast often sinned, 
And sinful yet must be : 
Deal kindly with the erring one, 
As God has dealt with thee." 

Finally, if we wish to love God much, we must think 
much of what we owe to him. Low views of sin lead 
to a light estimate of the blessing of pardon, and a 
light estimate of the blessing of pardon will lead to but 
a little love of God. This cuts deep, my brethren. 
Your love to God will be but the other side of your 
hatred of sin ; and there, as it seems to me, is the radi- 
cal defect in much of the religious experience of the 
day. Men make light of their obligation to Christ 
because they have first made light of sin. Low views 



THE TWO DEBTORS. 225 

of the evil of sin are at the root of all heresies in doc- 
trine and all unholiness in life. Get rid of all such 
minimizing ideas of sin, I beseech you ; and to that end 
come near the cross, for nowhere does sin seem so vile 
as it does there. May God open your eyes to see it 
there ; and then you will hate it with an utter hatred, 
and, being forgiven, will love Christ with an exceeding 
love. 



226 TUE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XV. 

THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 

(Luke x. 25-27.) 

The occasion which called forth this parable is as 
well known as the parable itself. One of the class of 
lawyers, who were not solicitors or barristers, as among 
us, but rather expounders of the books of Moses, came 
to Jesus with the inquiry, " Master, what shall I do to 
inherit eternal life ? " We cannot tell what his motive 
was for proposing such a question. The Evangelist in- 
forms us that he was " tempting " Jesus ; but the word so 
rendered simply means that he was putting him to the 
test, and it may be used either in a good or a bad sense. 
It is possible that this inquirer thought that he might 
succeed in embarrassing the Lord, either by reducing 
him to silence or by entrapping him into some inconsist- 
ency. But as the question which he put had reference 
to the most important subject which can engage the at- 
tention of any man, I am inclined to believe that he was 
sincere. The Lord replies to him, as he did to so many 
others, by putting a question in his turn. Through the 
understanding of that which they already knew, he 
sought to lead men up to the perception of that which 
they were inquiring after. So he said to this man, 
" What is written in the law ? How readest thou ? " 
In answer the lawyer gave a correct summary of the 
ten commands, according to the word of Moses in 



TIIE GOOD SAMARITAN. 227 

Deuteronomy and Leviticus ; whereupon, desiring there- 
by to bring him to a sense of his own sinfulness and 
helplessness, the Saviour said, " Thou hast answered 
right : this do, and thou shalt live." But he had not 
done that ; and as the point of the Saviour's probe was 
coming a little too near to be quite comfortable, he 
sought to fence off all further thrusts by diverting the 
conversation into a discussion about the meaning of a 
word. So he asked, " Who is my neighbor ? " and he 
got for answer this simple story, which, like the picture 
of a skilful artist, speaks for itself, finding its way at 
once " through the eye to the heart," and disdaining all 
elaborate exposition as absolutely unnecessary. 

But two things must strike every attentive reader. 
The first is, that the parable was not so much an answer 
to the question formally put by the lawyer, as an expo- 
sure of the state of heart which the putting of that ques- 
tion revealed. The inquirer wanted a definition of the 
word " neighbor." The Lord answers by showing him 
true neighborliness in contrast with selfish indifference. 
He wished to know whom he was to consider as his 
neighbor : the Lord answers by showing him the actions 
of one who did not need to put any such question, and 
leaves him to draw the inference, that, wherever the 
true spirit of benevolence is present, it will not stand 
in the face of suffering, mocking it with the cry, " Who 
is my neighbor ? " but will recognize the claim of every 
afflicted and down-trodden fellow-man to sympathy and 
succor. Thus the parable does not tell us in form who 
our neighbor is, but it shows us how true love works. 

But the second peculiarity of this parable is, that it is 
not an allegory, each figure in which represents a spir- 
itual analogue ; but simply an illustrative example of 
the working of benevolence, as contrasted with that of 



228 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

selfishness. If we look at the parable of the sower, we 
find, that Jesus gives the interpretation after this fash- 
ion, " This is he which received seed by the wayside ; " 
" He that received the seed into stony places, the same 
is he," etc. ; " He also that received seed among the 
thorns is he," etc. ; " But he that received seed into the 
good ground is he," etc. Each kind of ground thus repre- 
sented or signified a different sort of hearer of the Word. 
But you could not so interpret the parable of the good 
Samaritan. You could not say the traveller is so and 
so, the thieves are such and such, the priest is this class, 
and the Levite that, and the good Samaritan a third, 
while the inn is meant to symbolize one thing, and the 
two pence another. That would lead us into unending 
absurdity. The interpretation is given by our Lord, 
when, pointing to the good^ Samaritan, he said, " Go, 
and do thou likewise." Therefore the story is an ideal- 
ized example of true benevolence in contrast with utter 
selfishness. It may have been actual fact. There is 
nothing of improbability about it. The road from Jeru- 
salem to Jericho was dangerous from its being infested 
with robbers ; priests and Levites were likely enough 
to be often on it, as Jericho was a priestly city ; and a 
Samaritan might be there on business. So that there is 
no inherent impossibility, or even improbability, in the 
supposition that it was an actual occurrence. We in- 
cline, however, to the view that it was purely imagina- 
tive, but the product of that highest sort of imagination 
which gets at the deepest truth through fiction. In any 
case, it is not an allegory, but an illustration, designed 
to show us what we must avoid, as well as what we 
must cultivate, if we would truly and fully love our 
neighbor as ourselves. 

First we see a traveller set upon by robbers, who 



THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 229 

strip him of his money, his raiment, and his goods, 
and wound him, and depart, leaving him half dead. 
Very clearly there is no neighbor-love in that. Next 
we observe a priest coming along, on his way from 
Jerusalem to his country home; but, though he sees 
full well the straits to which the unfortunate man 
has been reduced, he "passes by on the other side." 
Just as clearly there is no neighbor-love in that. Then, 
after the priest has gone out of sight, a Levite makes 
his appearance. As he comes up to the victim of the 
robbers' violence, he pauses a few moments to look at 
him, and we begin to think that he will do something 
for him ; but, after all, he also " passes by on the other 
side." Just as clearly there is no neighbor-love in that. 
After he has gone, a Samaritan on horseback rides up ; 
and as soon as he perceives the poor man's plight, he 
dismounts, sets to work for the reviving of the half- 
dead one, by pouring oil into his wounds, and wine into 
his mouth, then lifts him up on to the saddle, and bears 
him to an inn, where he sees that he is well cared for 
at his expense. Then, when he departs on the morrow, 
he leaves with the host a sum sufficient for the immedi- 
ate wants of his proteye, and this blank check, as I may 
call it, to be filled in at the discretion of the landlord, 
to whom he was evidently well known : " Take care of 
him ; and whatsoever thou spendest more, when I come 
again I will repay thee." Now, here, the lawyer himself 
being the judge, — here was true neighbor-love. There- 
fore, teaching him out of his own mouth, Jesus said to 
him, " Go and do thou likewise. The suffering whom 
thou canst relieve, the ignorant whom thou canst in- 
struct, the degraded whom thou canst elevate, the op- 
pressed whom thou canst protect, wherever he may be, 
and whatever be his nationality, barbarian, Scythian, 



230 TUE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

bond or free, he is thy neighbor. Go, therefore, and do 
to him as the Samaritan did for the wounded traveller." 
Let us, therefore, analyze as far as we may the actions 
of this Samaritan, and see if we can get any fuller 
apprehension of the meaning of this "likewise." 

I. In the first place, then, it is clear that the kindness 
of this man was of the spirit, and not merely of the 
letter. Here was one main point of difference between 
him and the priest and Levite. They needed a specific 
injunction, but he wanted to carry out a great princi- 
ple. Had they found in the law a command to this 
effect, " If thou shalt see a man lying half dead upon 
the highwayside, thou shalt not pass him by unheeded, 
but shalt surely help him," I think that they would 
have exerted themselves for his deliverance. But be- 
cause the precept ran, u Thou shalt love thy neighbor 
as thyself," and did not define who their neighbor was, 
or what precisely they were to do for him, they ima- 
gined that they were under no obligation to do any thing 
whatever on his behalf. In the mind of the Samaritan, 
however, love meant the doing of every thing within 
his power, for all who required his help ; and therefore, 
without asking any questions or making any excuses, 
he gave the poor man all the assistance he could. 

This distinction must be clearly seen by every one, 
and, indeed, it is apparent in all departments of human 
activity. Thus, in the workshop, you have on the one 
hand the man who gives only his hands to his employer, 
and does mechanically only what he is hired to do, — no 
less, indeed, but no more, — and on the other you have 
the read)- and obliging artisan, who finds much to do 
which no contract can specify, and cheerfully does that 
without requiring to be asked. In the counting-house 



TUE GOOD SAMARITAN. 231 

there is, on the one hand, the lad who is always stick- 
ling about the performance of this or that piece of work 
because it is not in what he calls " his department," and 
who gets himself heartily hated for his pains ; and, on 
the other, the active and obliging youth, who does what 
he sees needs to be done, whether it is his own proper 
work or not, and whose sole ambition it is to promote 
the happiness of all around him, and advance the in- 
terests of his employer. So important is this distinc- 
tion as a criterion of character, that, if I were required 
to decide concerning a man's moral principle, I would 
not examine so carefully what he is in respect to what 
ethical writers ha ye called the determinate virtues, 
which are marked off by a well-defined boundary from 
their opposite vices, but I would investigate very thor- 
oughly what he is in regard to those virtues which are 
indeterminate, the measure of a man's devotion to them 
being left to the promptings of his own heart. A man 
cannot be a thief or a liar without crossing a well- 
marked boundary between right and wrong; but he 
may be a selfish churl without knowing it, because in 
regard to benevolence the law is left indefinite, being, 
indeed, like an algebraic formula, expressed in terms so 
general that they need to be translated by the occasion 
into definite particulars. Where the law is so broad 
as to be applicable to all circumstances, there is always 
a danger that some will feel no obligation to obey it in 
any circumstances ; and only the heart which has im- 
bibed the principle or spirit of the law will feel its force 
continually. Here, then, let us examine ourselves, and 
see what manner of men we are. If we do that only 
which is formally prescribed, and if, where the law 
leaves a blank to be filled up by circumstances, we act 
as if there was no law at all, then we have yet to learn 



282 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

what true benevolence is ; nay, more, we have yet to 
learn what kind of a book the New Testament is : for 
it is not a list of distinct precepts, each of which is 
applicable to only one case ; but it is a book of living 
principles of universal application, and he who really 
understands them, and has a heart to feel their obliga- 
tion, will be at no loss to find occasion for their mani- 
festation. To read it as if it were a set of rubrics, with 
minute directions for every detail of conduct, will make 
us Pharisees : to read it as a book of great principles 
that are to have free course through all our actions, 
even as the blood has through the body, will make us 
the disciples of Him "who went about doing good." 
Instead, therefore, of waiting for any minute definition 
in the letter, like that which this lawyer expected when 
he said, "Who is my neighbor?" let us show, that, 
taught by the Holy Spirit, and stimulated by the exam- 
ple of the Lord Jesus, we have learned to see that every 
sufferer whom we can assist has a claim of neighbor 
love upon us which we cannot repudiate without injur- 
ing him and dishonoring God. 

II. In the second place, we may perceive that this 
man's benevolence was not hindered by any prejudices 
of nationality or religion. The injured traveller was 
an entire stranger to him, but he did not say within 
himself on that account, " He has no claim upon me." 
He was, besides, a Jew. So much, indeed, is not said 
in the parable, because Jesus was speaking to Jews, and 
therefore they would suppose that one of their own 
nation was meant unless another nationality had been 
specifically ascribed to him. He was, then, a Jew ; and 
the feud between his people and the Samaritans, because 
it was a religious one, between people that were neigh- 



THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 233 

bors, and agreed in certain points while they differed on 
others, was exceedingly bitter : yet he did not exclaim, 
" Let him die, for all I care ! " No : he was a man, in 
great straits, and all other things were forgotten by 
him in the presence of these two. In other circum- 
stances he might have enjoyed a debate with him about 
the rival claims of Moriah and Gerizim, or perhaps he 
might have allowed his prejudice to carry itself so 
strongly as to make him pass him without any saluta- 
tion ; but in the presence of his misery he loses remem- 
brance, for the time, of such matters. Nationality is 
swallowed up by humanity, and sectarianism is put to 
flight by religion, as he dismounts to minister to a suf- 
fering fellow-man. 

Now, here, again, we are furnished with a test as to 
the genuineness of our own neighbor-love ; and by its 
application we may discover that our benevolence is 
often chilled, if not, indeed, absolutely killed, by some 
prevalent influences. These may be described as caste, 
denominationalism, and a certain prudishness which we 
may call purism. 

There is, first, caste. That is commonly supposed, in- 
deed, to be a heathenish thing, having no existence in 
our land of liberty and equality. But that is a popular 
delusion. The word may be foreign, but that which it 
signifies is home grown. There are Brahmans and 
Pariahs here, as really as in Hindostan. There are fami- 
lies brought up among us to believe that those who live 
in poorer houses or have darker skins than themselves 
exist for their benefit ; and, as a consequence, they treat 
them with despite. Their dignity would be lowered if 
they were to attend to sufferers in such humble circum- 
stances; and so, like the priest and the Levite, they 
pass them by on the other side. But true love knows 



234 THE PARABLE.- OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

nothing of any such distinctions. Rich and poor, white 
and black. Caucasian and Mongolian, are alike to her, 
when they are touched by the sanctifying hand of afflic- 
tion ; or. if she makes any difference between them, she 
3 the preference to the lowliest as having fewest 
friends. She believes that greatness, like wisdom. •• is 
ofttimes nearer when we stoop than when wr soar;" 
and in her ear the gratitude of the humblest whom 
she has relies e 3 is -^r:er far than the hollow flat- 
tery of worldly pride. 

Then there is denominationalism. Xow. let it not 
be snpj >sed that I iispnte the principle, that, while we 
should do good to all men as we have opportunity, 
there is an " especially " in the case of those who are of 
the household of faith ; or, that I deny that a church 
should have a peculiar care over its own poor. On the 
contrary, I admit both of these propositions. I 
altogether deny that a Christian's benevolence should be 
i re stric ted within the "bounds of his own denomination, 
or even of the Church of Christ. We are Christians 
Gist, before we are denominationalists ; we are men 
before we are Christians : and I have an utter abhor- 
rence of that system which refuses to help those who 
cannot pronounce t; shibboleth " as we do. or who have 
not yet found their way to the foot of the cress. Had 
this Samaritan insisted, that, before receiving his assist- 
ance, the poor traveller should have assented to the 
pre-eminence of Gerizim over Jerusalem, he would only 
have insulted the misery which he was offering to 
alleviate. But before the majesty of suffering, all such 
sectarianism disappeared; and it should be so among 
ourselves. When a man'- house is ml fire, we do not 
stay to bid him repeat the Apostles' Creed before we 
begin to help him to extinguish the flames: and it 



THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 235 

seems the paltriest of all proceedings, to restrict our 
benevolence to any class of religionists. The great 
thing we have to do in a case of suffering is to relieve 
it; and it is not without the deepest suggestiveness, 
that the relief here was given by a man who belonged 
to a sect which Christ himself, on another occasion, de- 
clared to be clearly in the wrong. So that, in his view, 
we are left to infer that heterodoxy showing love is a 
better thing than orthodoxy manifesting indifference. 

The last thing tending among us to counteract be- 
nevolence is what I have called purism ; and it is 
characteristic of those who have set themselves up as 
guardians of the public morals, so that they can not or 
will not help those who have brought their suffering 
upon themselves by their sins. Now, here, again, I am 
as far as possible from saying that benevolence should be 
exercised so indiscriminately as to bestow a premium 
upon vice ; and I must confess, that in this city, and in 
these days, a wise caution should be exercised when we 
seek to do good to others. Either we should ourselves 
make personal inquiry into each case, or, through the 
medium of the Charity Organization society, we should 
make sure that we are dealing with a real necessity, 
and not helping to maintain one of those professional 
" bummers " who prey upon the gullibility of the peo- 
ple. I have nothing to say against such discrimina- 
tion in our benevolence ; but what I want to condemn 
is the spirit of those who say in the face of deepest 
misery, "Well, he has brought it upon himself. He 
has made his own bed, let him lie upon it as best he may. 
It is only what he deserves." Such language might be 
appropriate in the mouth of an angel, — only there is not 
one of them who would use it, — but it is dreadful in 
the mouth of a sinful man. " What he deserves ! " Has 



236 THE PAP, ABLE S OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

not the great dramatist said, " Use every man after his 
deserts, and who should 'scape whipping?" And what 
and where should we now have been, if God had acted 
toward us on such a principle ? Thus, for all so ear- 
nest as it seems in virtue's cause, this purism is at heart 
a Christless thing. Be it that the man has brought it 
upon himself ; is he for that to die unhelped, while we 
stand by and piously moralize over his misdeeds ? It 
will be time enough to give our moral lesson when his 
misery is alleviated, and we may then hope that it will 
be heeded ; but to give a lecture when the cry is for 
help, is something like giving a serpent for a fish, or a 
scorpion for an egg. Thus again we come back to the 
queenly majesty of love, for wherever she exists she 
makes a way for herself. No fashionable barriers will 
stop her progress ; no denominational boundaries will 
hedge in her efforts; no guilt, even, will seal up the 
fountain of her beneficence. Over all such obstacles 
she will triumph ; and, be the sufferer who he may, she 
will see in him a man wearing the nature which the 
Son of God has consecrated by his incarnation, and 
ransomed by his blood; and, for his sake, she will 
relieve him. 

III. In the third place, it is obvious that this man's 
benevolence was not hindered by any considerations of 
personal convenience. He might have said within him- 
self, as he looked at the rapidly westering sun, " I must 
be in Jericho on urgent business, by a certain time." 
Or he might have reasoned after this fashion : " If I am 
found near this poor man, I may get into trouble, and 
be accused of robbing and maltreating him." Or, more 
plausibly still, he might have thought, " These cruel 
robbers cannot be far away, and they may attack me 



THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 237 

also : therefore I must hasten on as rapidly as possible." 
Or, in sordid avarice, he might have argued that he 
could not afford to do all that was required ; and so, like 
the priest and the Levite, he too might have passed by 
on the other side. But, no ! he could do nothing but 
help this poor, helpless man. It made no matter what 
should come to him. His business might take care of 
itself for the time ; he might be accused of the robbery ; 
he might even be robbed, himself ; it might cost him a 
good deal before he was done with it: but, whatever 
"came, this man should be helped. Thus he forgot him- 
self in the presence of the traveller's distress, and set 
himself at once to revive and relieve him. 

Now, by this, again, we may try our own benevo- 
lence ; and when we apply to it this testing acid, I fear 
that much of what looks like finely polished charity 
will prove to be no better than burnished selfishness. 
Many do kindnesses, that they may be seen and hon- 
ored of men. They will give, if the giving will secure 
them some coveted position, or in some way else, as 
the phrase is, " bring grist to their own mill." Some 
will give money to buy themselves off from personal 
exertion. Others will give their personal exertion to 
save their money. But in the instance before us, both 
were given ; for, what genuine neighbor-love does, it 
will do thoroughly. Self will save always what is 
dearest to self, but love is ready to sacrifice up to the 
extent of the necessity which it seeks to meet. And 
blessed be God, there is such love among us ! I have 
seen it in the wealthy Christian, whose money and 
whose time were largely given to the service of suffering 
humanity. I have seen it in the poor Christian, who 
out of compassion has taken into his home an orphan 
child, and done for it in every respect as for his own. 



238 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

I have seen it, too, where one would scarcely expect to 
find it, as when some despised "woman of the city" 
gives herself up to the tending of a guilty sister whose 
misery was deeper than her own. Alas that a case like 
that should put to shame the selfishness of many who 
claim to be the followers of the Lord Jesus ! 

IV. In the fourth place, it is evident that this man's 
benevolence took its form from the nature of the misery 
which he sought to relieve. He did the very things 
which the sufferer needed to have done for him, and he 
did these at once. He might, indeed, have put himself 
about in many other ways, under the idea that he was 
helping the unfortunate traveller; but nothing could 
have met the case save the method which he adopted. 
He had no stereotyped mode of showing mercy, which he 
sought invariably to follow ; but he did in each case just 
what each required. Now, this is very important, be- 
cause, for lack of attention to it, many people's benevo- 
lence, though it may be very well meant, is a total failure. 
In " Ivors," which is one of Miss Yonge's best stories, 
you may remember that there is a gouty old admiral 
who is continually saying most caustic yet true things ; 
and among other remarks bearing on the point now 
before us, he is represented as affirming that " There is 
a great mania abroad at present for doing good, and 
wonderfully little common-sense in setting about it." 
This witness is true ; and in few things is the lack of 
common-sense more apparent than in the neglect to 
adapt the efforts which are put forth, to the necessities 
which they are designed to meet. Thus, a man has 
been wonderfully successful in one or more instances 
by using a particular method, and forthwith he becomes 
so enamoured of it that he uses it on every sort of occa- 



THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 239 

sion ; but in the vast majority of cases it fails, because 
it is not adapted to more than one class of instances. 
In the fortifications on the Dardanelles, there are said 
to be some guns which are so built in, that they can hit 
a vessel only at one point; and so they are useless 
except at the moment when a ship is passing that point. 
Now, the benevolence of the man of whom I am now 
speaking is like one of these guns. It can meet only 
one class of cases ; whereas it ought rather to be like the 
swivel-gun upon the turret-ship, which sweeps the hori- 
zon round and round. Even as, in perfect consistency 
with the general principles of medical science, the 
remedy must be changed to meet the disease, so our 
efforts in practical beneficence must take their shape 
from the evils which we mean to mitigate. The path 
which I take in going after him who is out of the way 
must be regulated by the situation of the wanderer, 
else I shall never find him. And so in every other case. 
Thus the surroundings of each instance of suffering 
must determine the form in which it is to be best met 
by benevolence ; and so the principle of love is kept 
from being stereotyped, and every case draws out new 
inventiveness. And what is true of individuals is also 
true of different ages and nations. The charities of the 
past will not meet the exigencies of the present, and 
the kind of instrumentality called into existence by the 
evils of a hundred years ago will not meet the new 
miseries of to-day. Thus the questions suggested in 
this particular by the parable before us are, " What 
interpretation is given to this c Go, and do thou like- 
wise,' by the requirements of our own times ? Where 
in these days shall I find the counterpart of this poor, 
half-dead traveller ? and what for me will correspond to 
the oil and the wine and the money which his benefac- 



240 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

toi gave? What Mid do thou likewise,' 

mean now and here for me ? " These questions, each 
one must grapple with and settle for himself: and, hav- 
ing found an answer to them, he must seek to meet the 
new necessity with means as admirably adapted to their 
purpose as were those which this Samaritan adopted. 
One will find this poor traveller in the little Arab of. 
the streets, and will seek through the Children's Aid 
Society or the Home for the Friendless, or other kin- 
dred agency, to rescue him from a future of crime, and 
prepare him for becoming a good and useful citizen 
and an earnest Christian. Another will see him in the 
poor victim of drunkenness ; and through the Christian 
Home for Intemperate Men, or some similar house of 
mercy, he will endeavor to secure his emancipation from 
the slavery of appetite. Another will find him in the 
freedman struggling up towards Christianity and educa- 
tion, and will help him in his ascent. But what need 
I more ? To identify this Samaritan in modern times, 
would take me round the entire circumference of human 
misery. You have but to open your eyes to see him 
anywhere : and, when you recognize him. see to it that 
you open your hearts and your hands for his assistance. 

V. But now. as supplementary to the teaching of the 
parable, I add. that, if our benevolence would be of 
the highest order,, we must exercise it out of regard to 
Him who died to show mercy to ourselves. I do not, 
of course, imagine that such a thought was in the mind 
of this Samaritan, even as Jesus has portrayed him. 
But I do see the great heart of Christ himself throbbing 
through this story. Was not he hirnself, in a very 
rd sense, the good Samaritan to the human race? 
And, as he points to Calvary, has he not a right to say, 



THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 241 

as none other can, " Go, and do thou likewise " ? Here 
is the grand motive power, under the influence of which 
that command is to be obeyed : " Ye know the grace 
of the Lord Jesus Christ, who, though he w T as rich, for 
your sakes became poor, that ye through his poverty 
might be rich." As he laid down his life, that we might 
be delivered, so let us make cheerful sacrifice of every 
thing, — money or time, or even, if need be, life itself, 
— for the sake of the suffering among our fellows. 
Thus our humanity will rise into Christianity, and our 
benevolence will be baptized into the name of the Lord 
Jesus. 

I conclude with the story of an incident in the life 
of my grandfather, which I have often heard from my 
father's lips. It was more than a hundred years ago, 
when wheeled conveyances were rarely used in the 
rural districts of Scotland, and the custom was to con- 
vey grain to the mill in a sack laid over a horse's back. 
The good man was making such a journey once, over a 
rough bridle-path ; and the horse stumbled, so that the 
sack fell off. The weight of years was on his shoulders, 
and he could not replace the load. As he was per- 
plexed, and wondering what to do, he saw a man on 
horseback in the distance, and had just made up his 
mind to ask him for assistance, when he recognized in 
him the nobleman who lived in an adjoining castle ; and 
then his heart sank again within him, for how could he 
request him to help him ? But he did not need to ask 
him, for he was noble by a higher patent than any mon- 
arch could confer; and,' when he came up, he dis- 
mounted of his own accord, saying, " Let me help you, 
John." So between them they put the load again upon 
the horse ; and then John, — who was a gentleman too, 
though he did wear "hodden gray," — taking off his 



242 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

broad Kilmarnock bonnet, made obeisance, and said, 
" Please your lordship, how shall I ever thank you for 
your kindness ? " — " Very easily, John," was the reply. 
" Whenever you see another man as sorely needing 
assistance as you were just now, help him; and that 
will be thanking me." 

So, as we contemplate the sacrifice of Christ on our 
behalf, we cry, " What shall I render unto thee, O Lord, 
for all thy benefits toward me ? " and there comes this 
answer : " Whensoever thou seest a fellow-man needing 
thy succor as much as thou wast needing mine when I 
gave my life for thee, help him, and that will be thank- 
ing me." " Inasmuch as ye do it unto one of the least 
of these my brethren, ye do it unto me." 



THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 243 



XVI. 

THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 

(Luke xi. 6-13.) 

This parable is introduced by Luke in connection 
with his account of the manner in which the Lord an- 
swered the request of his disciples, that he would teach 
them to pray, " as John also taught his disciples." They 
had seen him at his private devotions, probably had even 
overheard his supplications to his Father, and had been 
thereby made to feel how far they were from knowing 
any thing about such prayer as that which he had of- 
fered. Hence they asked to be instructed in the mat- 
ter ; and in response he gave them, both as a model and 
a form, that beautiful cluster of petitions which he after- 
ward repeated in his Sermon on the Mount, and which 
we are accustomed to call " the Lord's Prayer." Then, 
as some among them may have mentally interjected the 
objection, "But we have prayed frequently, and have 
received no answer," he told this simple story to encour- 
age them to continue in humble, fervent, believing, and 
patient prayer. The case is clearly a supposition ; and 
the parable, like that of the good Samaritan, which we 
have already considered, is illustrative, and not typical 
or symbolical. We must not say that the friend at mid- 
night represents God, or that the manner of the appli- 
cant at his door shows how we are to proceed in making 
supplication to God, or that the newly arrived stranger 



244 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

denotes any particular class, or that there is any special 
significance in the loaves. This story is merely an illus- 
tration, on which an argument is founded ; and it is of 
immense importance, that we have a correct idea of what 
that argument really is. 

First, however, let us have the case supposed clearly 
before us. It is midnight. A friend has arrived from a 
distance, and he to whose house he has come has nothing 
to set before him. In his extremity he goes to a neigh- 
bor, and knocks at his door to state his necessity, and 
to ask for help. But the sleepy response is, " Trouble 
me not : the door is now shut, and my children are with 
me in bed. I cannot rise and give thee." The suppli- 
ant, however, is not to be thus denied ; so he thunders 
away shamelessly, even impudently, at the door, until, 
in sheer despair of getting any rest otherwise, and sim- 
ply to get rid of what he deems a nuisance, his neighbor 
rises, and gives him what he wants. " I say unto you," 
says the Lord, " though he will not rise and give him 
because he is his friend, yet because of his importu- 
nity " — or rather, as it ought to be rendered, " shame- 
lessness," or, more strongly still, "impudence" — "he 
will rise and give him as many as he needeth." Then 
the Lord proceeds to give the Magna Charta of prayer 
in the familiar words, " And I say unto you, Ask, and it 
shall be given you ; seek, and ye shall find ; knock, and 
it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh 
receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth, and to him that 
knocketh it shall be opened." To this he appends a 
comparison between an earthly father's dealings with 
his children, and those of our heavenly Father with his, 
thus : " If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a 
father, will he give him a stone ? or if he ask a fish, will 



THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 245 

he for a fish give him a serpent ? or if he shall ask an 
egg, will he offer him a scorpion ? If ye then, being 
evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, 
how much more shall your heavenly Father give the 
Holy Spirit to them that ask him?" 

Now, these last verses, as I believe, furnish the 
key to the argument in the parable. Like them, it 
reasons from the less to the greater, or, rather, from 
the worse to the better. It does not mean to repre- 
sent God as gruff and disobliging, like the neighbor 
newly roused out of his earliest sleep ; neither does 
it recommend the suppliant to use with God such 
shamelessness or impudence as his friend employed 
with him. But the suggested inference is this : If the 
impudence of that midnight knocker prevailed even 
with an angry and annoyed man so much, that he 
arose and gave what was requested, how much more 
will the humble, reverent, believing, and persevering 
prayer of a true child of God prevail with the infinitely 
kind and loving Father to whom he makes petition? 
Over against the irritated and reluctant man, only half 
awake, he places the calm, loving heavenly Father, "who 
slumbers not, neither sleepeth ; " while, in contrast with 
the impudence of his troublesome neighbor, he suggests 
such earnest pleading with a Father as that which they 
had just seen in himself, or as he had recommended in 
the form which he had given them. And the conclusion 
which he draws is : If the appeal in the former case was 
ultimately successful, how much more is it likely to be 
in the latter ! He is far from encouraging us to trust 
in boldness or irreverence or impudence in prayer, as so 
many misunderstand his words. We shall not be heard 
for our frequent speaking, any more than for our "much 
speaking." He would not have us trust in our prayer 



246 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

at all, but in the loving, fatherly heart of Him to whom 
we pray. Neither the place of prayer, nor the manner 
of prayer, nor the frequency of prayer, will avail. The 
answer will not come because of any of these things, but 
simply because God loves to give his people that which 
they request, if it be for their good ; and so, when we 
come to him, our thought should be rather of his grace 
and wisdom than of any merit in our supplications, or 
of any attribute in them that will constrain him, so to 
say, to comply with our petitions. We are to wait on 
God in reverence and faith, biding his time, and trusting 
in his mercy. For, if a surly man ultimately yields to 
impudence, much more will the good God give the 
humble, reverent suppliant that which he desires. 

I am the more anxious to set this clearly before you, 
because of many prevalent errors on the subject in these 
days. The tendency among multitudes, in regard to 
prayer, is to put more stress on the sort of prayer that 
is offered, than on the fact that all real prayer is offered 
to a loving God, who is better to his people than an 
earthly father is to his children ; and the notion of too 
many is, that, if they will only keep at it long enough, 
they will ultimately, and by sheer force of importunity, 
prevail, as a teasing child wears out the patience, and 
sometimes even dethrones for the time the wisdom, of 
his parent. But here is no enforcement of importunity 
of that sort ; rather, by implication, the impudence of 
this needy neighbor is condemned, and over against it 
is set such filial devotion as that which Jesus manifested 
when he was praying to his Father. "Wait on the 
Lord," — that is the lesson. Wait upon him because 
he is the Lord, and not a surly man who cannot be 
troubled with your prayer ; and, because he is the 
Lord, wait upon him in humility, in faith, in patience, 



THE FBIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 247 

and with such reverence as is due to Him who is the 
King of kings and Lord of lords. 

But some may say, "We have tried thus to wait upon 
him, and though we have waited long our prayers are 
still unanswered : how, then, can we reconcile this ex- 
perience of ours with the unqualified promise in these 
words, ; Ask, and ye shall receive ; seek, and ye shall 
find ; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every 
one that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth, 
and unto him that knocketh it shall be opened ' ? " 
Now, what answer can we give to these troubled spirits ? 
Must we admit that God has been unfaithful to his 
promise ? Nay, for he is the Faithful One. What, then, 
shall we say ? The answer will take us into the con- 
sideration of the conditions of successful prayer ; and 
as on this subject, especially in its relation to the cure 
of diseases, there are current among us so many views 
which savor more of presumption than of faith, it may 
be well to discuss it with some degree of fulness. To 
that, therefore, I shall devote the remainder of this dis- 



course. 



Let it be remembered, then, that the words here 
uttered by the Lord Jesus are not the only ones which 
he has spoken in regard to prayer ; and that, to have a 
comprehensive conception of the matter, we must take 
into consideration all his other utterances concerning 
it. The recognized rule in the explanation of a statute 
is, that we should expound it all in the light of what is 
called the interpretation clause ; and that, whenever we 
have a universal term by itself in one place, and have 
it repeated in the same connection, with certain qualifi- 
cations, in other places, we are to understand it as 

1 The substance of what follows was contributed by the author as an 
article to the Princeton Review. 



248 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

being always so conditioned in that connection. Now, 
to the universal terms here employed, there are some 
very important conditions attached elsewhere; and in 
the light of these must this promise be interpreted. 
Thus it is said by James, M Ye ask, and ye receive not, 
because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon 
your lusts:" 1 and again, "But let him ask in faith, 
nothing wavering 1 ; for he that wavereth is as a wave of 
the sea. driven by the wind and tossed." 2 To the same 
effect are the Saviour's own words, "Therefore I say 
unto you, what things soever ye desire, when ye pray, 
believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them." 3 
More important still is the qualification in the words, 
; * If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall 
ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you." 4 And 
again, in the Old Testament, " Delight thyself also in 
the Lord, and he shall give thee the desires of thine 
heart.*" 5 Nay, more : in the immediate neighborhood of 
one of the universal passages already quoted is the fol- 
lowing : - And when ye stand praying, forgive if ye 
have aught against any ; that your Father also who is 
in heaven may forgive your trespasses : but if ye do 
not forgive, neither will your Father which is in heaven 
forgive your trespasses." 6 Moreover, it cannot be for- 
gotten, that in the Bible itself we have mention of 
prayers offered for certain things which the suppliants 
did not receive : thus David fasted and wept and prayed 
for the life of his little child, and the child died after 
all ; while Paul desired that his thorn in the flesh might 
be taken from him, and received an answer indeed, but 
yet not the very thing which he requested. From all 
this, then, it is evident that this universal promise is to 

1 Jas. iv. 3. 2 id., i. 6. 3 Mark xi. 24. 

4 John xv. 7. 5 Ps. xxxvii. 4. 6 Mark xi. 25, 26. 



THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 249 

be understood as qualified by some indispensable condi- 
tions which connect themselves, first, with the character 
of the suppliant ; second, with the nature of the thing 
requested ; and, third, with the purpose and prerogative 
of God himself. By attending a little to each of these, 
their importance will be manifest. 

In the first place, then, the success of prayer is con- 
ditioned by the character of the suppliant. Not every 
kind of asking is acceptable prayer. That which men 
desire simply for the gratification of malice, or the pam- 
pering of appetite, or the satisfying of ambition, or the 
aggrandizing of selfishness, God has nowhere promised 
to bestow ; and unless there be in us the spirit to subor- 
dinate every thing to the honor of Jehovah, we have no 
warrant to expect an answer. Beneath every genuine 
prayer there must be evermore the disposition which is 
expressed in the doxology, " for Thine is the glory : " 
otherwise, the reproof of James will come in with fearful 
pungency, " Ye ask, and ye receive not, because ye ask 
amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts." l 

Again, the wish that simply flits across the soul, as 
the shadow of the cloud glides over the summer grass, 
is no true prayer. It must take hold of the spirit, and 
gather into itself all the energy and earnestness of the 
man. The popular idea, indeed, is that prayer is a very 
simple matter : but, in reality, it is the highest exercise 
of the soul, and requires for its presentation the con- 
centration of all its powers ; and the English prelate 
was right when he said that " no man is likely to do 
much good in prayer who does not begin by looking 
upon it in the light of a work to be prepared for, and 
persevered in, with all the earnestness which we bring 
to bear upon subjects which are, in our opinion, at once 

i Jas. iv. 3. 



250 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

most interesting and most necessary." ! To the same 
effect are the words of Coleridge. " Believe me," said 
he to his nephew, two years before his death, " to pray 
with all your heart and strength, with the reason and 
the will, to believe vividly that God will listen to your 
voice through Christ, and verily do the thing that 
pleaseth him at last, — this is the last, the greatest 
achievement of the Christian's warfare on earth. — Teach 
us to pray, Lord." 2 

But no one can long persist in such prayer without 
faith ; and so at this point the Saviour's qualifying word, 
" believing, ye shall receive," is appropriate. The ear- 
nest petitioner knows that he is not beating the air. 
His faith is not in his prayer, but in his God ; and the 
stronger that faith is, the more earnest will be his per- 
severance. Even though he knows that the blessing is 
coming, nay, just because he knows that it is coming, 
he will, like Elijah on Mount Carmel, go again and 
again, until in the little cloud he sees the beginning of 
the answer. 

But more important even than any of these conditions 
in the character of the suppliant is that laid down by 
Jesus, when he says, " If ye abide in me, and my words 
abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be 
done unto you." The man who is abiding in Christ has 
his eye purified so that he clearly perceives what things 
he ought to ask ; while at the same time he is in that 
state of preparation which renders the granting of his 
prayers a blessing to him, and not a curse. We need, 
therefore, to be in a high condition of holiness before 
we can have fulfilled to us the promise, " Ye shall ask 

1 Bishop Hamilton ; quoted by Liddon, in Some Elements of Re- 
ligion, p. 172. 

2 Coleridge's Complete Works, vol. vi. p. 237. 



THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 251 

what ye will, and it shall be done unto you." We 
must not take the first part of that declaration, and 
divorce it from the second : it is only in the measure in 
which we are abiding in Christ, and his words are abid- 
ing in us, that we have any right to expect that our 
prayers shall be answered. Behold how this was seen 
in Abraham when he took it upon him to speak unto 
the Lord. It was the meeting of friend with friend. 
On the one hand Jehovah said, " Shall I hide from 
Abraham that thing which I do?" and, on the other, 
Abraham said unto the Lord, " Peradventure ten shall 
be found there ;'" and the answer came, "I will not de- 
stroy it for ten's sake." We are apt to imagine, at first 
thought, that all this was the manifestation of mere 
earnestness ; but out of what did that earnestness spring ? 
It sprung out of the closeness of Abraham's walk with 
God ; that is, out of his abiding in God, and of God's 
words abiding in him. So it was with all the others 
spoken of in the Bible as successful suppliants. Daniel, 
the beloved, had his eyes opened, in answer to his 
prayers, because he was so exalted in character ; and 
he who saw the great Apocalypse was the disciple who 
leaned upon the Master's breast at supper, and had 
drunk in most of his spirit. Successful prayer is thus 
the fruitage of a holy character ; and it is only when 
we delight ourselves in God, that we can calculate upon 
receiving the desires of our hearts. It is thus, indeed, 
a great thing to pray ; and, when all these things are 
taken into consideration, we need not be surprised that 
so few, comparatively, of our requests are answered. 
The cause is not in God, but in ourselves ; for, tried by 
these tests, the best of us must confess that we have 
rarely prayed at all. 

But a second class of conditions connect themselves 



252 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

with the nature of the thing requested. That which 
we ask must be in accordance with God's will. Beneath 
every genuine supplication, there is the spirit of resig- 
nation breathed by Jesus himself in his Gethsemane 
anguish : " Nevertheless, not as I will, but as Thou wilt." 
We are ignorant and short-sighted, and very often ask 
for things which would be hurtful to us. We cannot 
see the end from the beginning; and so, frequently, 
that which at present seems to us desirable would ulti- 
mately prove injurious. When, therefore, we ask for 
such a thing, God does with us precisely as we do with 
cur own children, and keeps it from us for our good. 
There are many instances of this in Scripture, and it is 
so common in human experience that even Shakspeare 
has referred to it in these lines : — 

" We, ignorant of ourselves, 
Beg often our own harms, which the wise powers 
Deny us for our good : so find we profit 
By losing of our prayers." 

Nor is this ignorance only partial, and confined to 
certain petitions. " Ye know not what ye ask," is true, 
in a very deep sense, even of the simplest request which 
is presented to God. Who can tell all that is involved 
in the granting of a single desire ? It seemed a little 
thing to the sons of Zebeclee, to ask that they should 
sit, the one on the right hand, and the other on the left 
hand, of the Master in his kingdom, — a thing to be 
granted as easily as one sets a chair for another in a 
room ; but, in reality, it involved in it the drinking 
of a cup of agony, and the submitting to a baptism of 
fire, of which at the moment the two apostles did not 
dream. Now, the very same ignorance which James 
and John manifested regarding the meaning of their 



THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT 253 

prayer, exists in us all regarding the effect which the 
granting to us of the very thing we ask would have 
upon us. We cannot tell what bearing on ourselves, 
or on our households, or on our church, or on our 
neighborhood, the giving to us of the very thing we 
ask may have. We ask for worldly prosperity ; but 
perhaps it is denied us, because God sees that if we had 
it, we should become full, and deny him. We ask for 
deliverance from that physical weakness which makes 
to us, it may be, every work a burden ; but no strength 
comes, — perhaps because God sees that only by some 
such chronic disability he can keep us at his feet. And 
so with other things. God is no mere blind, indulgent 
father, who gives his children every thing they ask. 
He is wise and kind, and has, withal, the discrimination 
of omniscience ; so he gives only that which will be 
best : and, if we were to view the matter rightly, we 
should see as much reason to be thankful to him for a 
refusal as for an answer to the letter of our prayers. 

But this condition, connecting itself with the nature 
of the thing asked, is nearly akin to the third class of 
conditions which spring out of the purpose and prerog- 
ative of God himself. This is a view of the case which 
has not been sufficiently attended to by Christians. 
" The hearer of prayer " is not the only relation in 
which God stands to his people. He is their Father 
as well ; and he is, besides, the moral Governor of the 
intelligent universe. Therefore he uses his prerogative 
in answering prayer for moral purposes ; and the ac- 
tion which he takes on the petitions of his children is 
a portion of that discipline to which he subjects them, 
and by which he trains them into strength and holiness 
of character. Or, it may be, that the kind of answers 
which he gives is determined by the influence which 



254 THE PAEABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the suppliant's example may have on others. He may 
give what is asked, in order that they who ask it may be 
convinced of the folly of their request. He may deny 
that which is besought, in order that by the denial he 
may open the suppliant's eyes to the need of higher 
blessings, and stimulate him to ask for these. Or, he 
may give something else than that which is craved, be- 
cause, while it will be equally valuable to the petitioner, 
it will be an encouragement and assistance to many 
others. 

There are illustrations of all these in the word of 
God. Thus, when the children of Israel in the wilder- 
ness cried for supplies, it is said that "he gave them 
their request, but sent leanness into their soul." * So, 
again, when the tribes desired a king, he gave them 
Saul, that, through the infliction of that monarch's arbi- 
trary and capricious tyranny, they might be convinced 
of the wickedness of their desire. Never was there a 
more devout and sincere suppliant than he with whom 
God talked face to face ; and yet, when he pressed his 
suit to be permitted to enter Canaan, Jehovah an- 
swered, " Let it suffice thee : speak no more to me of 
this matter," 2 in order that all people might know from 
this denial, even to Moses, how dreadful a thing sin is 
in the sight of the Lord. For a similar reason, prob- 
ably, it was, that David's prayer for the life of his child 
was not granted. And, when Paul thrice besought the 
Lord for the removal of his thorn, the answer came 
not in the healing of his body, but in the strengthening 
of his spirit ; that believers in every age might be able 
to appropriate the promise, " My grace is sufficient for 
thee : my strength is made perfect in weakness." 

It is thus apparent that the promise of answer to 

1 Ps. cvi. 15. 2 Deut. iii. 26. 



THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 255 

prayer, though given in universal terms in some pas- 
sages, is qualified by the wisdom and love of Him who 
gave it ; and that he will keep it only in so far as it 
shall be for the highest welfare of his people that he 
should. While declaring, in general phrase, that he 
will give what his children ask, God yet, to speak after 
the manner of men, reserves to himself a certain dis- 
cretionary power, so that he may either deny that which 
is requested, or bestow something else, according as he 
sees what shall be best in all the circumstances of each 
case. His great design, in the administration of his 
moral government, is to advance the interests of the 
gospel, and through that to promote holiness and happi- 
ness among men. Now, the hearing of prayer by him 
is only a means to that end. It is not an end in itself. 
God does not exist simply and only to answer prayer. 
He is the Governor of the world, and the Father of his 
people ; and his hearing of prayer is only one among 
many means which he employs for the discipline of his 
people and the training of them into holiness. 

Now, if these views are sound and scriptural, then 
there may be deduced from them three inferences of 
great practical value. 

In the first place, we may see how impossible it is for 
us to discover the results of prayer, by any merely hu- 
man test. How, for example, shall we determine when 
a true prayer is offered ? If so much depends on the 
character and spirit of the suppliant, how can any one, 
who is unable to read the heart, tell when the request 
which a seeker presents is such as God can approve ? 
How, again, can any external observer take cognizance 
of such spiritual considerations as those which must 
enter into the determination of the questions whether, 
and in what form, a prayer has been answered ? Where 



256 TEE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

are the delicate instruments which shall indicate or 
measure the results, on the character of the suppliant, 
which are produced sometimes by the denial and some- 
times by the granting of his requests? Therefore we 
cannot classify results here, and argue from them, as 
we do in statistical investigations. The demand which 
was made some years ago, for a scientific test of prayer, 
betrayed on the part of those who made it ignorance of 
the fact that prayer lies not in the plane of physical 
science, but in that of moral and spiritual things ; and 
indicates a spirit not unlike that of the Israelites of old, 
when they tempted God, and said, " Is the Lord among 
us, or no ? " In the wards of the hospital, the physician 
deals with each patient according to his disease, his 
temperament, his constitution, and his history. He 
does not give each what he requests. He may even 
gixe to one the very thing which he has just denied to 
the patient next him. And he does all that from con- 
siderations altogether be}*ond their knowledge, and per- 
haps, also, above their comprehension. He is there, 
not simply to grant their requests, but to heal their 
diseases. So with God and his people. He treats each 
one as he requires ; and grants his prayer,- or refuses to 
grant it, according as it will best promote his spiritual 
welfare. But how can men, who look merely on the 
outward appearance, take cognizance of considerations 
which are patent only to the eye of God? Xo mere 
human test can distinguish a true prayer from a false 
one ; and if it cannot judge of the cry which comes out 
of the lips of a man, how can it analyze the answer 
which comes out of the heart of God ? 

But, as a second inference from this whole subject, it 
may be seen, that, to be successful suppliants, we must 
be holy men. " The secret of the Lord is with them that 



THE FBI END AT MIDNIGHT. 257 

fear him, and lie will show them his covenant." 1 Char- 
acter, as God sees it, gives its quality to prayer ; and 
they who are nearest akin to God in holiness get the 
most frequent answers to their requests. Yet this is 
the consequence of their holiness, and not the reward 
of it. Their purity of heart has clarified their spiritual 
perception, so that they see plainly what they should 
ask for, and asking that they are not disappointed. 
Thus the prevailing prayer of the closet is that of the 
"righteous man," and the measure of personal holiness 
is the measure also of the power of petition. You hear 
of the great results that have been wrought by prayer, 
in the history of men and institutions ; and few more 
striking things are written anywhere on that subject 
than those to be found in " Praying and Working," by 
Dr. Stevenson of Dublin. But beware of supposing 
that nothing but asking is involved in such successes. 
The asking was of a peculiar kind : it was that of men 
who lived much with God, and were doing much for 
God, and whose characters, in the life of every day, 
illustrated the gospel of the Lord Jesus. It was that, 
moreover, of .men who were diligently seeking, by the 
use of appropriate means, to answer their own prayers ; 
and not by one spasmodic leap can we vault into their 
privilege. It belongs only to their holiness and ac- 
tivity;' and through growth in these alone shall we 
grow into their success. But if we seek it only for the 
success's sake, or only to be like those who have been 
successful, we shall ignominiously fail. They sought it 
from God, that they might give it to God ; and those 
who would imitate them must do the same. 

As a final inference from these considerations, it may 
be noted how necessary it is that prayer should be 

1 Ps. xxv. 14. 



258 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

characterized by entire submission to the will of GkxL 

The undertone of every supplication should be. M Thy 
will be done."' There is a warrant for stretching ear- 
nestness up to this point, i; Father, if it be possible ; " 
but that must always be combined with the M neverthe- 
less, not as I will, but as thou wilt."' That is a prayer 
which is always answered ; and the answer to it can t rin l 
ultimately nothing but blessing to him who breathes it 
sincerely, though in the immediate future there may be 
betrayal and crucifixion. So let the Christian go his 
way, undistracted by the unguarded things which spirit- 
ual enthusiasts have said about the power of prayer; 
and, having faith in God. let him leave every request 
with him, sure that in the end he shall either get that 
which he seeks or something better. Thus, in the words 
of the good Leighton. •• True prayers never come weep- 
ing home ; " and again. u This is the excellent advan- 
tage of the prayer of faith, that it quiets and establishes 
the heart in God. "Whatsoever be its estate and desire, 
when once he hath put his petition into God's hand, he 
rests content in holy security and assurance concerning 
the answer, refers it to the wisdom and love of God 
how and when he will answer : not doubting that what- 
soever it be. and whensoever, it shall be both gracious 
and seasonable. But the reason why so few of us find 
that sweetness and comfort that is in prayer is because 
the true nature and use of it are so little known/' 



THE FOOLISH BICH MAN. 259 



XVII. 

THE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 

(Luke xii. 13-21.) 

The character of a man is often indicated by the di- 
rection which his thoughts take when he is listening to 
a religious exhortation. Commonly, indeed, the speaker 
gets all the blame if he cannot hold the attention of his 
auditors to the subject which he desires to impress upon 
them. But, frequently, the true cause is to be found in 
the fact that the soul of his hearer is inthralled by some 
overmastering passion. Here, for example, the greatest 
of all preachers, even the Lord Jesus Christ himself, 
while speaking of such important matters as the danger 
of hypocrisy, the comfort that comes from the knowl- 
edge of the universality of the providence of God, and 
the duty of confessing the truth before men, relying on 
the promised help of the Holy Spirit, is interrupted by 
the ejaculation of one of the company to this effect : 
"Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the in- 
heritance with me." The topic thus introduced had 
nothing whatever to do with those which the Lord had 
just been handling. The interruption, therefore, was 
unseasonable. It was even impertinent, inasmuch as 
it thrust the personal squabbles of individuals, a.bout 
property, on the attention of those whom he wished to 
think of topics immensely more important. It was, be- 
sides, an attempt to traffic in the eminence which Christ 



260 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

had acquired as a teacher, by enlisting him on the side 
of one of the disputants in a family quarrel, much as 
men in prominent positions nowadays are pestered with 
applications from every quarter to give their influence 
to enterprises which are to profit individuals who care 
nothing for them, save that they think they can make 
something out of their names and position. 

It was, therefore, with some degree of severity, that 
the Lord replied, "Man, who made me a judge or a 
divider over you ? " There were properly constituted 
tribunals in existence for the settlement of all such dis- 
putes, and to them the complainant might apply. The 
Lord had no jurisdiction in the case. He was not au- 
thorized by those who alone could give him the position 
of a judge, to deal with such matters; and if he had 
consented to take action in them, he would have been 
held as setting himself up as the rival and antagonist 
of the legal courts of the land. Therefore, just as 
he declined to settle categorically the question about 
tribute, he here refused to listen to the complaint which 
had been so intrusively thrust upon his attention. It 
was no part of his mission to meddle directly with legal 
or political affairs. He came for the regeneration of in- 
dividuals, and through that alone did he desire or design 
to affect the public life of the nation. Therefore he 
would be no judge in such a matter as this man brought 
before him. The man might, or might not, have right on 
his side : the courts would determine that. But whether 
he had, or not, one thing was clear, — the mere making 
of this demand by him, at such a time, and in such a 
manner, showed that he was moved by covetousness ; 
and so, rising from the individual case, the Lord ad- 
dressed himself to the evil of which it was a manifes- 
tation ; and, turning to the multitude, he said to them, 



THE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 2G1 

" Take heed, and beware of every form of covetousness," 
— for so, according to the best manuscripts, the clause 
should be read. 

But what is covetousness ? It is not simply the desire 
of property. For that is one of the instincts of our na- 
ture ; and the effort to acquire wealth plays a most im- 
portant part in the education at once of the individual, 
the nation, and the race. At first, indeed, such is the 
influence of our depravity, the desire for property may 
develop the direst selfishness : but it is undeniable, that, 
in proportion as a people obtains it, it rises both morally 
and socially ; whereas, where no property exists, you 
have neither laws, literature, civilization, nor religion. 
The attempt to acquire riches stimulates frugality, de- 
velops forethought, and encourages that kind of self- 
denial which subordinates present enjoyment to future 
good ; while, again, the possession of property leads to 
the respect of the rights of others. So close, indeed, is 
the connection between these two things, that, wherever 
property ceases to be respected, there you have an end 
of law, and an absolute reign of anarchy and terror. 
The men who took for their creed the infamous dictum, 
that " property is theft," saw the legitimate outcome of 
their principles in the Parisian commune ; and when now 
their apostles are preaching their favorite doctrine even 
in our own land, it is well that we should be reminded 
of the consequences to which such teachings lead. 

The desire of property, therefore, with a view to its 
right and legitimate use, is not only not covetousness, 
but is lawful and right. As Robert Hall has said, " If 
there were no desire for wealth, there would be no 
need of it. It would soon cease to exist at all, and so- 
ciety would go back to a state of actual barbarism." l 

1 Hall's Works, vol. i. p. 147. 



262 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Oovetousness, therefore, is neither the having of money, 
nor the desire to have it for the uses to which it may- 
be rightly put ; but it is the desire of having it simply 
for the sake of having it, — the making of that which is 
at best a means of ministering to life or comfort or 
enjoyment or usefulness, into the great end for the 
gaining of which we live. 

Now, there is always a danger, in our depraved na- 
tures, lest we should allow that which Qught to be kept 
subordinate, to become the controlling motive of our ex- 
istence ; and because money is so closely identified with 
our daily lives, and so needful for the supply of our com- 
mon and ordinary wants, that danger is specially great 
in reference to its acquisition. Besides, the fact that in 
our modern society a man is too frequently estimated by 
the magnitude of his wealth only increases the peril : 
so that we have peculiar need of the warning, " Take 
heed, and beware of every form of covetousness," — 
which simply means, Beware of setting up the posses- 
sion of property or riches as the chief good, to which 
every thing else is to be made subservient. Let not the 
acquirement of wealth become the absorbing ambition of 
your life. Set not your heart on possession as the great 
object of your desire. Do not live simply to make 
money and hoard it up ; but use what property you 
may acquire, for the promotion of those higher and 
more spiritual ends, the attainment of which ought to 
be the great aim of your existence. 

That is the meaning of the Saviour's caution, and he 
enforces it with this consideration : " For a man's life 
consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he 
possesseth." The clause thus rendered is, in the origi- 
nal, somewhat involved, and is rather difficult to trans- 
late. It is thus given literally in the margin of the 



THE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 263 

Revised Version : " For not in a man's abundance con- 
sisteth his life from the things which he possesseth ; " 
and some have taken it to mean, that a man's life does 
not depend on the surplus of what he has above what 
he needs ; while others would take it as denoting that 
life, in its higher sense, does not consist in possession, 
but in character. In the former case, the words simply 
enunciate the truth that little is needed to support 
life, viewed as mere animal being and well-being. As 
William Arnot has expressed it in his little volume on 
" The Race for Riches : " l "A very small portion of the 
fruit of the earth suffices to supply a man's necessities. 
The main elements are a little food to appease hunger, 
and some clothing to ward off the cold. These, as a 
general rule, the poor man obtains ; and what more 
can the rich consume ? In this matter God has brought 
the rich and the poor very near to each other in life, 
and at death the slight difference that did exist will be 
altogether done away." This is doubtless, in the main, 
true ; and it accords readily enough with some aspects 
of the teaching of the parable which the statement on 
which we are now commenting was meant to introduce. 
But still it seems to me to fall sadly beneath the high 
level of our Lord's general treatment of the subject of 
life, and therefore I greatly prefer the other interpreta- 
tion. Life, in all its breadth and depth of significance, 
as the proper exercise and enjoyment of a rational, spir- 
itual, and immortal being, such as a man is, does not 
consist in possession, but in character ; and the true 
riches are the riches of the soul toward God. " A man's 
life," as distinguished from that of a beast, does not 
depend on wealth. His happiness, his usefulness, his 
honor, may be secured without riches ; and as, before 

1 pp. 45, 46. 



264 THE P ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

God, he is estimated by what he is, rather than by what 
he has. Money is not the chief good. There are many 
things which it cannot purchase, but which yet may be 
acquired and possessed by those who are poor in this 
world's possessions. Of this sort are health, happiness, 
character, usefulness, and especially that acceptance 
with God, that relationship to Christ, "in knowledge 
of whom standeth eternal life," which we call salvation. 
There are wealthy men who are destitute of all these 
things ; and there are many among the poor who possess 
them all, being u rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom 
of heaven," With a fact like that before us, therefore, 
we can easily see that "a man's life," in its noblest 
sense, as the life of one worthy to be called a man, 
" consisteth not in the abundance of the things which 
he possesseth." 

Now, it was to illustrate and enforce this truth, that 
the Lord spake the parable of the foolish rich man. 
The story is in itself so plain as to need little or no 
explanation. A certain land-owner, already possessed 
of so much that he is called a rich man, saw an un- 
usually large crop upon his fields, and began at once 
to consider how he should dispose of it. He had no 
thought, indeed, of doing any thing with it but keeping 
it to himself ; but even to do that, he felt that he would 
require larger accommodation than he possessed. So he 
determined to pull down his barns, and build greater ; 
and then, as if already his purpose had been carried 
out, he rejoiced hi anticipation over the "good time" 
which he would have, for he exclaimed, "I will say 
unto my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for 
many j^ears ; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry." 
But alas! he had forgotten to take God into his reckon- 



THE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 2G5 

ing, and at the very time when he was gleefully calcu- 
lating on this future enjoyment, the decree came forth 
from the Eternal, " Thou fool, this night thy soul is 
required of thee ; then whose shall those things be 
which thou hast provided?" That is the story, and 
the Lord adds the moral thus : " So" — that is, such a 
fool, and so great — " is he that layeth up treasure for 
himself, and is not rich toward God." 

The essence of the lesson, thus, is the folly of this 
rich man ; and therefore the true interpretation will be 
found in the answer to the question, Wherein did his 
folly consist? To the consideration of that question, 
therefore, let us now address ourselves. 

And here, in the first place, the folly of this man 
appears in the fact that he completely ignored his 
responsibility to God in the matter of his possessions. 
He speaks of " my fruits " and " my goods," and the 
Lord describes him as laying up treasure "for himself" 
No doubt he had cultivated his ground, and sown his 
seed ; but, after all, the greatest factor in the production 
of his wealth had been God, who had sent his rain and 
sunshine, and so caused his crops to grow luxuriantly. 
Yet he speaks throughout as if he had all the merit of 
his prosperity, and gives God no praise ; while the idea 
that any portion of the increase of his fields belonged 
to God seems never to have entered into his mind. 
But does this man stand alone in this particular? Are 
we not all too sadly in the same condemnation with 
him ? How many among us glory in the fact that they 
are, as the phrase is, self-made men ? Have we never 
heard the boast in the mouth of a successful merchant, 
that he is the architect of his own fortune ? and are we 
not all too prone to take to ourselves the sole credit for 



266 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

any property we have acquired, or for any eminence 
we have reached? Yet it is just as true in every 
department of life, though perhaps not quite so ap- 
parent, as it is in agriculture, that the chief factor to 
success in it is God. He gave the original aptitude 
and ability to the man ; his providence furnished the 
means of cultivating both of these, and opened up the 
avenues to prosperity ; and it will commonly be found 
that the critical turning-points of life, which led directly 
to the results over which we felicitate ourselves, were 
due entirely to him, and came altogether irrespective 
of our own arrangement. Why, then, should we take 
the whole credit to ourselves ? Would it not be more 
appropriate for us to say, "Not unto us, O Lord, not 
unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy 
and for thy truth's sake " ? 

But the restriction to himself of the honor of his suc- 
cess led directlv to the complete appropriation by this 
man of its fruits. He regarded them as exclusively his 
own. He acted as if he felt that God had no claim 
to any part of them whatever. Far from looking upon 
himself as God's steward, he took every thing for him- 
self. Therefore he never thought of consulting God 
about the disposal of his property. He asked no advice 
of any one : he simply " spake with himself. 1 ' '* My 
goods are my own, and I shall do with them as I 
please," — that was the language of his heart; whereas, 
if he had been animated by a right spirit, he would have 
said, " My fruits are thine, O God : show me what thou 
wouldst have me to do with them." Now, am I unchar- 
itable when I say that there are too many in these 
modern times who resemble the man in the parable in 
this also ? Multitudes never pray to God about their 
business at all. Some may pray that he would send 



TIIE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 2G7 

them prosperity ; but when the prosperity comes, how 
few there are, comparatively speaking, who lay their 
wealth at his feet, and ask him to direct them in dis- 
posing of it ! Disposing of it ! alas, that is the last 
thing they ever think of. Their one aim is to keep it, 
and, if possible, to increase it. Accumulation is their 
great ambition ; and if they spend at all, they spend, too 
many of them at least, on their own indulgence, and 
not in the furtherance of those good and noble objects 
with which the glory of God and the welfare of men 
are identified. We cry out against those defalcations 
on the part of trusted officials in banks and other com- 
mercial houses, which have been so frequent among us 
in recent years ; and I would not say a single word 
either in vindication or in extenuation of such iniquity. 
It is as wicked as it is said to be, and deserves the 
severest punishment ; but how many of those who are 
loudest in its condemnation are themselves guilty of 
similar defalcation before God, inasmuch as they have 
kept for themselves, and spent on themselves, the wealth 
which he has intrusted to them for the welfare of 
others and the glory of his name? The creed of the 
communist is the extreme protest against this extreme 
of selfishness, and, like all other extremes, it is itself as 
bad as that against which it protests ; but if the New- 
Testament doctrine of stewardship were universally 
acted upon by those who are possessed of property, 
communism would cease to exist. Property has its 
responsibilities, as well as its rights ; and if its responsi- 
bilities were more fully acted on, its rights would be 
more sacredly respected. The communist says to the 
capitalist, " What is yours is mine, and I will come and 
take it by force." That is theft. But the Christian 
says, "What is mine is God's; and I will use it, under 



2G8 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

his direction, for the good of others." That is steward- 
ship ; and in that alone is the antidote to the troubles 
which have so long agitated the countries of the Old 
World, and which, alas ! are making their appearance 
now among ourselves. It is an awful folly for the man 
of wealth to ignore his responsibility to God for the use 
which he makes of his wealth. The crash of 1793, and 
again of 1871, in Paris, might have taught him that if 
he had cared to learn. God grant there may not come 
to him a more terrible lesson in the outburst of a vol- 
cano beneath his very feet in this new land ! 

But, in the second place, the folly of this man appears 
in the fact that he ignored the claims of other men upon 
him for his help. He had no idea, apparently, that there 
was any other possible way of bestowing his goods than 
by storing them in his barns. As Augustine, quoted 
by Trench, 1 has replied to his soliloquy, "Thou hast 
barns, — the bosoms of the needy, the houses of widows, 
the mouths of orphans and of infants ; " these are the 
true storehouses for surplus wealth. It is right to pro- 
vide for those who are dependent upon us ; it is pru- 
dent to lay up something in store against a possible evil 
day : but after that, the storehouse of wealth should be 
benevolence. By scattering it in useful directions, it 
will be most effectually preserved ; and there are not a 
few among us to-day, who, in the reverse of fortune 
that has come upon them by recent disasters, can say, 
" I have still at least that which I gave away : it was 
given to the Lord, and he has taken care of that." I 
have somewhere read that a lady once went to call upon 
a friend near the close of autumn, and found her empty- 
ing her closets, and exclaiming, " Oh, these moths ! 

1 Notes on the Parables, p. 334. 



THE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 209 

these moths! they have consumed almost everything 
that I laid away in the beginning of the summer." 
The visitor expressed her sorrow, but said she did not 
know what it was to have a garment moth-eaten. 
Whereupon her friend asked for the specific which she 
used, and to her surprise received for answer, " I gave 
away to the poor, months ago, all the garments for 
which I had no longer use ; and there was no difficulty 
in preserving the remainder from the moths." The 
true storehouse for our surplus is benevolence. That 
is a barn which is large enough for all that we can put 
into it ; and, rightly bestowed in that barn, our treas- 
ures are where " neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, 
and where no thieves break through to steal." Benevo- 
lence clips the wings of riches, so that they do not fly 
away ; while, at the same time, it sweetens the breath 
of society, and deprives the agitator of the stock in 
trade wherewith he infuriates the " sand-lot " audience 
to deeds of violence and confiscation. He who has is, 
in a very important sense, a debtor to him who has not. 
As I have elsewhere said, 1 " What I have that another 
has not, is to be used by me, not for my own aggrandize- 
ment, but for the good of that other, as well as for my 
own. It is committed to me as a trust, and is to be 
expended by me for the benefit of others as well as for 
myself. The greatness of exceptional endowment, of 
whatever sort it may be, carries with it an obligation 
to similar exceptional greatness of service. This is the 
gospel principle. It makes the powerful man the pro- 
tector of the weak ; the rich man, the provider for the 
poor ; the learned man, the teacher of the ignorant ; and 
the free man, the emancipator of the enslaved. Thus, 
by so much the wealthier a man is, if he acts on this 

1 Contrary Winds and Other Serrnons, p. 191. 



270 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

principle, it will be just so much the better for the poor, 
for whom he is a trustee." That is the only principle 
that can preserve us from constant imbranglement be- 
tween class and class in society; and they who ignore it 
are not only dishonoring God, but are foolishly furnish- 
ing the fuse for unscrupulous men to use in the produc- 
tion of some dynamite explosion that may shake the 
nation to its centre. 

But, in the third place, the folly of this man is seen 
in the fact that he imagined that material things were 
proper food for his soul. The mere animal life of the 
body may be supported by such goods as this man was 
about to lay up, but the soul needs something better 
than these. Its true food is God himself; and hence 
Jesus, in the moral of the parable, calls the man who has 
that "rich toward God." The Psalmist tells us, that, 
when the Israelites lusted after flesh to eat, " God gave 
them their request, but sent leanness into their soul," * 
— words which plainly imply, that, while the body may 
be pampered with its material food, the soul may be 
really starving. So, again, in reply to Satan, the Lord, 
quoting from Deuteronomy, said, "Man shall not live 
by bread alone, but by every word of God;" 2 and 
when his disciples, having left him hungry, came back 
to the well, and could not get him to eat, he replied, 
"I have meat to eat that ye know not of; " "My meat 
is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his 
work." 3 That is the true food of the soul. All else for 
it is worse than the husks which the swine did eat 
were to the prodigal. 

But we may get at the same conclusion in another 
way. Thus we speak of a man's being rich in inteh 

i Ps. cvi. 15. 2 Matt. iv. 4. 3 joim i v . s±. 



TUB FOOLISH RICLT MAN. 271 

lectual resources, meaning thereby that he has the 
means of satisfying, to a large extent, the cravings of 
his mental nature ; while, when we say of another 
that he is deficient in intellectual resources, we wish 
it to be understood that he has in himself nothing to 
fall back upon in the hour when he is cut off from all 
material delights. Now, carrying this mode of speech 
up to that moral and spiritual department which is 
the highest in our complex humanity, we see at once 
that he is rich who has a good conscience, a will in 
unison with God's, and joy in the contemplation of 
Jehovah ; while he is poor whose soul is burdened with 
a sense of guilt, which he cannot remove, and whose 
heart is filled with horror and dismay at the prospect 
of standing naked and open before the eyes of Him 
with whom he has to do. True riches — or, in other 
words, the true food of the soul, by which alone it 
can be nourished and satisfied — are to be found in 
God alone. Reconciliation to God, peace with God, 
likeness to God, and fellowship with God, — that alone 
can fill the heart of man. God for us in the work of 
his Son, God with us in the orderings of his providence, 
God in us in the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and 
God before us in the hope of heaven, — that is the true 
food of the spirit of man ; and to think of sustaining 
it with material fruits and goods and possessions, is as 
absurd as it would be to try to satisfy the hunger of 
the body with a diamond, or to quench the thirst of the 
body with a pearl. As the poet has expressed it, — 

" Attempt, how monstrous and how surely vain ! 
With things of earthly sort, with aught but God, 
With aught but moral excellence, truth, and love, 
To satisfy and fill the immortal soul. 
Attempt, vain inconceivably ! attempt 



212 TriE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

To satisfy the ocean with a drop, 

To marry immortality to death, 

And with the unsubstantial shade of time 

To till the embrace of all eternity ! " * 

This was the folly of the rich man here. Let us take 
care that it be not also ours ; for " God has made us for 
himself, and our souls must be ever restless till they 
rest themselves in him." 

But now, finally, the folly of this rich man is ap- 
parent from the fact that he had entirely ignored the 
truth that his material possessions were not to be his 
forever. When the decree went forth, " This night thy 
soul shall be required of thee," he could not prevent 
its being carried out. All his wealth could not bribe 
the death-messenger that came to summon his soul into 
the presence of its God, or avail to lengthen his life on 
earth a single hour. And when he went, he could not 
take his riches with him ; for, as the Spanish proverb 
has put it with a horrible distinctness, " There are no 
pockets in a shroud." "How much did he leave?" 
asked one man of another, in the street-car, as they 
were talking of a millionnaire whose death had been an- 
nounced in the morning paper. " All he had,''' was the 
solemn and suggestive answer. Let these two things 
stand out in lurid distinctness on tins subject : wealth 
cannot buy off death, and when we die we can take 
none of it with us ; and then you will understand how 
supremely foolish it is for a man to live simply and 
only for its accumulation. 

But another thought is suggested here. Then 
"whose shall those things be which thou hast pro- 
vided ? " Ah, me ! if some of those wealthy men who 

i PoUok's Course of Time, Book IV. 



THE FOOLISH RICH MAN. 273 

have gone in recent years from this busy, bustling city, 
into the world beyond, could come back for a moment, 
and see what fightings there have been over their for- 
tunes ; how the details of their own idiosyncrasies have 
been dragged out into the light, to prove, if possible, 
that they had not sense enough to make their wills ; 
how the most painful secrets of their lives have been 
proclaimed upon the housetop; how the skeleton in 
their closet has been handled and laughed over by 
the profane and unfeeling crowd ; and how their sons 
and daughters and relations, out to the farthest limit of 
consanguinity, have wrangled over their portions, — I 
think they would say within themselves, "What con- 
summate fools we were, to spend our days on earth 
in laying up treasures to be squandered thus in the 
courts, and to be quarrelled over by a hungry crowd, as 
wolves howl over carrion ! " And if they had to live 
again, they would try, I think, to be their own execu- 
tors, and to use their possessions in a way that would 
bless the world and glorify their God. There has been, 
as I cannot help thinking, a grim irony in God's provi- 
dence, in cases like these ; and as I read the reports of 
the surrogate's court from time to time, I am reminded 
of the words, " He that sitteth in the heavens shall 
laugh ; the Lord shall have them in derision." At all 
events, they prove conclusively the short-sightedness 
and folly of those whose sole delight in life was the 
adding of dollar to dollar. 

But a deeper thought is here suggested : " Whose shall 
those things be ? " Whose were they all along ? They 
were God's, and should have been used for God. You 
remember, in that most glorious scene in David's glori- 
ous reign, when he brought out what he had gathered 
for the building of the temple, and consecrated it all 



274 THE PARABLES OF OUR 8AVIOUB. 

1, and his people willingly followed his example, 
he used these remarkable words : ** All things eome of 
. and of thine own have we given thee : for we 
_ - and sojourners, as were all our fathers ; 
our days on the earth are as a shadow, and there is 
none abiding." 1 Mark the : i :: of that for in this con- 
nection. Men come and go. but God is the immortal 
owner of all things ; and in giving to him of our pc sses- 
. we but give him of his own. Friends, if there 
were more acknowledgment of that truth among us, 
there would be more liberality like that of David, and 
our missionary and benevolent - aeties which are con- 
tinually laboring in the rearing of the great spiritual 
temple of his Church would not be so often in straits 
with their balances so largely on the wrong side of 
the ledger. Think on these things, I beg of you, and the 
Lord give you understanding in all things. 

We see now how the moral of this story is estab- 
lished. *• So is he that heapeth up treasure unto him- 
ind is not rich toward Gc "..'" The first great thing 
for us is to be rich toward God : and that will keep us 
from giving undue importance to earthly treasure, — 
nay. it will teach us how to use that treasure, and show 
us that we may keep it best by spending it for God. 
That is the gist of the whole matter. 

I ought now, therefore, to proceed to consider the 
question how these riches toward God are to be acquired 
. however, your time forbids me 
to enlarge. James gives one answer when he speaks 
of God as having chosen the poor of this world rich in 
faith : 2 and Paul supplements his statement when he 
exhorts Timothy to charge them that are rich in this 
world, that they be "rich in good works." l Faith in 

i 1 Chron. xxix. 14. 15. ■ Ja& iL& '<■ 1 Tim. vi. IS. 



THE FOOLISH IUCH MAN. 275 

Jesus Christ enriches us, by giving us the blessings of 
forgiveness, peace, holiness, and heaven; and good 
works, wrought as the outcome of gratitude for these 
blessings, enrich us with present happiness and future 
reward. These are things which the world cannot give 
or take away. These are things which are the posses- 
sions of our soul, and of which death cannot deprive 
us. The one of them is a present heaven, and the other 
will be an enrichment of the heaven that is in the 
future. Lay up these treasures for yourself, then, for 
no power can take them from you. And if you make 
that spiritual accumulation your supreme care, covetous- 
ness will find no lurking-place within your heart ; for 
the wealth of earth will be valued by you only for the 
good works which it will give you the means of per- 
forming, and so the gold that is material and uncertain 
may become, in a wondrous way, transmuted into the 
riches which are spiritual and abiding. Here is some- 
thing better than the philosopher's stone, for it turns 
material gold into immortal riches. 



276 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XVIII. 

THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 

(LvLke xiii. 6-9 J 

It was a common belief among the Jews, that the 
coming of special calamities on a man was a proof that 
he had been guilty of peculiarly aggravated sin. In 
spite of the teaching of the argument of the Book of 
Job upon the subject, that doctrine held its place hi 
the popular creed; and we meet with it on more than 
one occasion among those with whom our Lord came 
into contact in his public ministry. Nor was it a mere 
harmless superstition ■ for it tended to generate, hi the 
hearts of those who cherished it, both uncharitable 
judgments of others, and Pharisaic opinions of them- 
selves. If they who specially suffered were thereby 
proved to have specially sinned, then it followed that 
those who had been signally exempt from calamity were 
thereby shown to be particularly excellent. It was 
therefore, we may be sure, with such condemnation of 
the sufferers, and such appreciation of themselves, that, 
at the very moment when the Lord was upbraiding his 
hearers with their inability to discern the signs of the 
times, certain of those who were present told him of 
the massacre by Pilate of some Galileans, while they 
were in the act of offering sacrifice in the court of the 
temple. Thej^ complacently took credit to themselves 
for exemplary holiness, while they implied that the vie- 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 277 

tims of Pilate's cruelty were guilty of unusual wicked- 
ness. But the Saviour gave them to understand that 
in all this they were only confirming his statement as 
to their inability to read the signs of the times. For 
those unfortunate worshippers whom Pilate slew had, 
in a very true sense, died for the nation. Their fate 
was a warning of that awful judgment which was im- 
pending over the whole people ; and the same thing 
was true of those who had been killed not long before 
in Jerusalem, by the falling on them of a tower in 
Siloam. The fact was, that, unless they repented, they 
should all perish " likewise," — not simply also, but in 
like manner ; for Trench 2 is undoubtedly right when 
he says that " the threat is, that they shall literally in 
like wise perish," and adds, "Certainly the resemblance 
is more than accidental between these two calamities 
here adduced, and the ultimate destruction which did 
overtake the rebellious Jews, as many as refused to 
obey the Lord's bidding and to repent. As the tower 
of Siloam fell, and crushed eighteen of the dwellers at 
Jerusalem, exactly so multitudes of its inhabitants were 
crushed beneath the ruins of their temple and their 
city ; and during the last siege and assault of that city 
there were numbers also who were pierced through by 
Roman darts, or, more miserably yet, by those of their 
own frantic factions, in the courts of the temple, in the 
very act of preparing their sacrifices, so that literally 
their blood, like that of those Galilaeans, was mingled 
with their sacrifices, one blood with another." Thus, 
what the news-tellers reported as evidence of aggra- 
vated wickedness in the case of the sufferers, Jesus 
interpreted as a warning to the nation as a whole ; and 
it was to enforce that lesson yet more plainly and 

i Notes on the Parables, pp. 346, 347. 



278 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

pointedly, that he spoke the parable of the barren 
fig-tree. 

It rims to this effect: "A certain man had a fig- 
tree planted in his vineyard ; and he came and sought 
fruit thereon, and found none. Then said he unto the 
dresser of his vineyard, Behold, these three years I 
come seeking fruit on this fig-tree, and find none : cut 
it down ; why cumbereth it the ground ? And he 
answering said unto him, Lord, let it alone this year 
also, till I shall dig about it, and dung it: and if it 
bear fruit, well ; and if not, then after that thou shalt 
cut it down." 

There is nothing in the terms of this simple but 
solemn allegory requiring minute explanation. It was 
no uncommon thing for the owner of a vineyard to 
plant a fig-tree in it; and the expectation that it should 
bear fruit there was warranted by the exceptional atten- 
tion which was bestowed on it in common with all 
within such an enclosure. 

So, again, if for three consecutive years after it had 
come to maturity, such a tree should bear no fruit, it 
might fairly be accounted barren, and would be removed, 
not only as being itself useless, but also as taking up 
ground which might be more profitably occupied by 
something else. It is easy, therefore, to understand why 
the owner of the vineyard should have said of such 
a tree, " Cut it down." Nor is it difficult to compre- 
hend the feeling which would urge the gardener to say, 
"Let it alone this year also." He had taken great 
pains with it ; he had done for it all that he could think 
of: and, though it had all been vain, he could not cut 
it down without giving it another chance. So he begged 
for it one more year of grace, during which he would 
use stronger measures than ever ; and, if these should 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 279 

fail, then he would cut it down without compunction. 
It is all very natural. It might have been a conversa- 
tion last autumn, in some modern garden in this neigh- 
borhood, between a master and his servant, about some 
particular fruit-tree ; and yet, natural as it is, it is used 
here by the Saviour as a symbol of the most solemn 
spiritual truth. 

For, taking the key which is furnished to us by the 
occasion on which the parable was spoken, the interpre- 
tation is easily opened up. The fig-tree is the Jewish 
nation. The vineyard is the enclosure of privilege, 
within which that nation was secluded from all others, 
and which insured to it the unspeakable advantage of 
a revelation from God through the prophets. The 
coming of the lord of the vineyard, seeking fruit, rep- 
resents the Divine expectation of holy character from 
the people, as the outcome of the exceptional position 
in which he had placed them. The three consecutive 
years must not be pressed into significance, as denoting 
any special epochs in Jewish history, or as designating 
the years of our Lord's public ministry. Rather, they 
represent the whole course of the history of Israel, the 
results of which were spiritual barrenness and Divine 
disappointment. Then came the fiat, " Cut it down : 
why cumbereth it the ground ? " which symbolizes the 
decree for the destruction of Jerusalem, and the removal 
of the Jews from their vineyard privileges, preparatory 
to, and in order to, the calling of the Gentiles. But 
the carrying out of that is delayed at the intercession 
of the vineyard-dresser, who represents the Lord Jesus 
himself, and whose mediation secured a longer day of 
grace for the Jews, with the promise of his concurrence 
in their doom, if, after all, they should be still unfruitful. 

The primary application of the parable is thus to the 



280 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Jewish nation ; and the exposition which I have just 
given is its interpretation, properly so called. But the 
principles which underlie that interpretation are for all 
time, and we may very profitably spend the remainder 
of the discourse in considering their bearing on our- 
selves. They are, briefly, these : That much will be 
required of those to whom much has been given ; that, 
if those to whom much has been given fail to meet that 
which is required of them, sentence of destruction will 
be pronounced against them ; and that, though the exe- 
cution of this sentence may be deferred at the interces- 
sion of Christ, it will certainly be carried out if there 
be no repentance and amendment manifested. 

I. Now, looking at the application of these principles 
to ourselves, we may see, in the first place, that God 
has placed us in the most favorable circumstances for 
the bringing-forth of fruit. The privileges of the Jews 
were small in comparison with those which we enjoy. 
True, they had the oracles of God ; but the system 
under which they lived was mainly typical, prophetic, 
and preparatory. God manifested himself to them, but 
he did so in a manner that was shadowy and pictorial 
rather than substantial and real. The light which they 
enjoyed was that of the early dawn : ours is that of the 
noonday sun. They had the prophets, we have the Son 
of God. They had typical sacrifices, we have the great 
propitiation. They had a temple material and symbolical, 
Ave have the temple spiritual and true. Let any one 
read the Epistle to the Hebrews ; and, as he discovers 
how point after point is made by the writer in the 
course of his demonstration that Christ is the mediator 
of a better covenant, which was established on better 
promises than that of Sinai, he will understand how 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 281 

true it is, that our privileges are as much greater than 
those of the Jews of old, as those of the Jews were 
than those of the Gentiles by whom they were sur- 
rounded. 

Nor is this all : when we contrast our situation in this 
free land with that of almost all the other nations of 
the earth, even at the present day, we shall see reason 
to conclude that no people, with but one possible excep- 
tion, enjoy such spiritual advantages as those which, by 
the favor of God, we here possess. The children here 
are born into an atmosphere which is already highly 
charged with Christian^. They have the best educa- 
tional facilities. The Bible is early in their hands. 
Many of them are trained in Christian homes. Still 
more of them are taught in Christian Sunday schools. 
There are no legal disabilities attached to their adher- 
ence to Christianity. It is not a crime, as it has some- 
times been in other lands, and as it is still in some, to 
have a Bible. We have absolute liberty of worship; 
and there is no privilege of citizenship depending on any 
form of religious belief, or on the observance of any par- 
ticular religious ordinance. Never were greater Chris- 
tian advantages enjoyed by any people than we now and 
here possess. Truly " the lines have fallen unto us in 
pleasant places, and we have received a goodly heri- 
tage." Surely, if God could say with truth, in that age 
of the world's history, regarding Israel, "What could 
have been done more to my vineyard that I have not 
done in it ? " 1 he might so speak, with even more force, 
of all that he has clone for us. We glory in our institu- 
tions. We call ourselves the envy of the nations. We 
fondly regard ourselves as the pioneers of progress. 
But let us never forget that responsibility is propor- 
tional to privilege. 

1 Isa. v. 4. 



282 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

II. For God expects exceptional fruit from a tree on 
which he has bestowed such exceptional advantages, 
and that is the second point to which I would here give 
prominence. If we have so much more than other na- 
tions, we ought to be just so much better than they. 
For the fruit in this case is that of character. It is 
commonly supposed, indeed, that fruitfulness in the 
Christian life is to be shown by the success of our labors 
in bringing others to the knowledge and acceptance of 
Christ, and there are many who would measure Chris- 
tian fertility simply and only by usefulness. Now, use- 
fulness is exceedingly valuable, and it is the duty and 
the privilege of every one who has found Christ for 
himself, to bring others to him ; but, as an accurate ex- 
pounder of the New Testament, I cannot allow you to 
rest in the idea that usefulness is the only fruitfulness. 
This point is so important that I must ask your special 
attention to it. Let me quote to you a few passages 
where the word " fruit " occurs : " The fruit of the Spirit 
is in all goodness and righteousness and truth ; " " The 
fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gen- 
tleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance ; " " Giv- 
ing all diligence, add to your faith virtue, and to virtue 
knowledge, and to knowledge temperance, and to tem- 
perance patience, and to patience godliness, and to god- 
liness brotherly kindness, and to brotherly kindness 
charity ; for if these things be in you, and abound, they 
make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful 
in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ ; " " Ye have 
your fruit unto holiness." x Now, putting all these to- 
gether, it becomes apparent that fruitfulness is, first 
and before all things else, in character, in holiness, in 
what we are rather than in what we clo, and only in 

1 Gal. v. 22, 23; 2 Pet. i. 5-8; Rom. vi. 22. 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 283 

what we do so far as that is the genuine outcome and 
spontaneous revelation of what we are. Usefulness is 
the result of character, and must never be lost sight of ; 
but character is first, and in that the fruit of our posi- 
tion in God's vineyard is chiefly to appear. Righteous- 
ness, meekness, fidelity, — in a word, moral excellence 
springing from our faith in Christ and our devotion to 
him, — that is the fruit which God expects to find in us 
as the occupants of his vineyard. Has he seen that in 
us? or, in spite of all our privileges, are we just like 
other people in other lands, — selfish, mammon-loving, 
unscrupulous, unrighteous, eager to take advantage of 
others, and seeking only to please and profit -ourselves ? 
The question is all-important ; for on the answer which 
must be given to it will depend our immortal welfare 
as individuals, and the permanence and prosperity of 
the nation. 

III. For now observe, in the third place, that God pro- 
nounces sentence of destruction on all who, having had 
such privileges, bring forth no fruit. In his discourse 
on the true vine, Jesus says, " Every branch in me that 
beareth not fruit he taketh away ; " and again, " If a 
man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is 
withered ; and men gather them, and cast them into the 
fire, and they are burned." * So again, in the Sermon 
on the Mount we have these words : " Every tree that 
bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down and cast 
into the fire." 2 The statement is unmistakable, and in 
the providence of God there have been many illustra- 
tions of its truth. What could be more marked, indeed, 
in this connection, than the case of the Jews themselves? 
They were the people of God's possession, the objects of 

i John xv. 2, 6. 2 Matt. vii. 19. 



284 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

scnliar regard. He brought them out of the land 
of Egypt, and planted them in Palestine ; he sent unto 
them his prophets ; he trained them by the discipline of 
his providence ; he dwelt among them in the mystic she- 
chin ah glory of the holy of holies. If ever any nation 
might have looked for exemption from the operation of 
a law, it was surely that of the Jews. But no, they 
came under its most rigid sweep : and just because they 
had received so much, they were all the more severely 
Le "_: with for their guilty barrenness. Their temple 
was razed to the foundations, their capital was de- 
stroyed, their country was given to others, and they 
themselves- were scattered among the nations, even 
until this day. 

T\'e may see a similar instance in those seven Asiatic 
churches to whom the Book of Revelation was ad- 
dressed. They, too, had rare privileges and ample 
warning : but they failed to rise to their responsibility, 
and the candlestick of each has long since been taken 
out of its place, so that the very regions which they 
occupied have come under the influence of Mohammed- 
anism, and need to be Christianized anew. More mod- 
ern instances may be found in the cases of those lands 
which, like Spain, Italy, and France, refused to accept 
the blessings of the Reformation when it was in then 
power to do so, and have been contending with difficul- 
ties ever since. But in thinking of these we may not 
forget ourselves, for the law holds of individual churches 
and individual men, as well as of nations : and if we wish 
to secure permanent prosperity and existence as a con- 
gregation, we must remember that we can do so only by 
maintaining constant friutfulness in works of faith and 
labors of love, and holiness of character. When these 
disappear, and barrenness sets in, then there will come 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 285 

the sentence, " Cut it down." The history of the past 
will not compensate for the sterility of the present. 
We cannot live upon a reputation, any more than the 
Jews could save themselves because they were able to 
say, " We have Abraham to our father." The church's 
life depends on the present members of the church, and 
only through their fruitfulness can its permanence be 
insured. The same is true of individuals. When they 
cease to grow, they cease to live ; and barrenness is at 
once the symptom of death, and the reason why they die. 

IV. But observe, in the fourth place, that this sen- 
tence pronounced on the barren fig-tree is not at once 
carried into execution. The vine-dresser interceded, 
and the lord of the vineyard acquiesced. So God 
has forbearance for a time, even toward those who are 
doomed to destruction, if haply they may yet repent 
and return to him. The flood is foretold ; but between 
its announcement and its coming a hundred and twenty 
years elapse, during all of which God's Spirit is striving 
with man, to bring him, if possible, to a sense of his 
guilt and danger. And here, in the case of the Jewish 
nation, even after their crucifixion of the Lord Jesus, 
there was a respite of forty years, during which, in all 
the power of their Pentecostal baptism, the apostles and 
early Christians were at work to lead them to repent- 
ance. Now, it is an interesting fact brought out here, 
that for all such respite as interposes, in any case, be- 
tween evil desert and its immediate punishment, men 
are indebted to the intercession of Christ. If he had 
not been provided as the Lamb slain from the founda- 
tion of the world, the race would have died when Adam 
sinned ; and it is a solemn thought, that the continued 
existence even of those who ridicule his love, and bias- 



286 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

pheme his name, is due to the intercession of Him whom 
they revile. 

But a respite or reprieve is not a pardon. It is only 
a postponement ; yet, because it is a postponement, men 
are apt to think that God has lost sight of them, and 
will not hold them to an account. Thus the forbear- 
ance of God is misinterpreted as if it were indifference, 
and the sinner under it is tempted to go more reck- 
lessly into wickedness. If, when a man is in the act of 
committing his first theft, some unusual thing were to 
happen, and the thief were to be surprised into the ac- 
knowledgment of God's omniscience, he would regard 
that as a Divine interposition ; but because nothing like 
that occurs, he takes the absence of it as an evidence of 
the Divine indifference. So men judge of God as if he 
were such an one as themselves; and "because sentence 
against an evil work is not executed speedily, the 
hearts of the children of men are fully set in them to 
do evil." x But there is no Divine indifference in the 
case. The stroke of justice is only arrested for a 
season, and its arrest is due to the mediation of the 
great High Priest. Take care, therefore, lest you fall 
into the mistake made by those of whom Peter speaks, 2 
who, because all things continued as they had been, 
leaped to the conclusion that they would always be as 
they were, and so regarded that forbearance which was 
meant to give space for repentance as an actual mani- 
festation of indifference, if not even of approval. But 
there is no indifference ; and if the fruitless man repent 
not, the day of the Lord will come to him also as a 
thief in the night, and he will suddenly be destroyed, 
and that without remedy. 3 

i Eccles. viii. ii. 2 2 Pet. iii. 3-10. « Prov. xxix. 1. 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 287 

For the guilt after such forbearance, and against it, 
will be greater than it was before, inasmuch as, with the 
addition of the day of grace, there is combined an in- 
crease in the efforts on the part of the vine-dresser to 
promote fertility. Mr. Arnot, whose own early labors 
make him a specially good authority here, has written 
thus : " The two chief applications employed in hus- 
bandry to stimulate growth and fruitfulness are digging 
and manuring. These, accordingly, the dresser of the 
vineyard undertakes to apply, in the interval, to the 
barren fig-tree. I think something may be gained here 
by descending into particulars. One of these agricul- 
tural operations imparts to the tree the elements of 
fruitfulness, and the other enables the tree to make 
these elements its own. Digging gives nothing to the 
tree, but it makes openings whereby gifts from another 
quarter may become practically available. The fertil- 
izer contains the food which the plant must receive and 
assimilate, and convert into fruit ; but if the hardened 
earth were not made loose by digging, the needed 
aliment would never reach its destination. Similar pro- 
cesses are applied in the spiritual culture. Certain dig- 
gings take place around and among the roots of barren 
souls, as well as of barren fig-trees. Bereavements and 
trials of various kinds strike and rend, but these cannot 
by themselves renew and sanctify. They may give pain, 
but cannot impart fertility ; the spirit, much distressed, 
may be as unfruitful as the spirits that are at ease in 
Zion. These rendings, however, are most precious as 
the means of opening a way whereby the elements of 
spiritual life conveyed by the Word and Spirit may 
reach their destination. The Lord who pours in the 
food for the sustenance of a soul stirs that soul by his 
providence, so that grace may reach the root and be 



288 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

taken in." 1 But if, after all that, the soul still refuses 
to unite itself to Christ, of course its guilt is all the 
heavier; and then comes the limit of forbearance, be- 
yond which there is neither respite nor remedy. 

V. That is the last lesson in the parable. May God 
enable us to lay it well to heart ! If you ask me where 
precisely that limit of forbearance is, I cannot tell. 
The great truth is, that there is such a limit; and it 
ought to be our effort to keep away from it as far as 
possible. But how shall we do that? How better than 
by turning now in repentance and faith to God by 
Jesus Christ, and so becoming part and parcel of the 
true and living vine, whereof he says, " I am the vine ; 
ye are the branches " ? Do not tempt the Lord by put- 
ting his forbearance to the test, as if you would see how 
far and how long it will stretch ; but go at once, and 
show that you account that " the long-suffering of God 
is salvation," and so the goodness of God will lead 
you to repentance. It is not yet too late. As the 
good, mild Leighton has expressed it, " Any of you that 
are stirred to any real desires of fruitfulness to him, I 
dare give you warrant to be confident of his not only 
forbearing upon such a desire, but of his favorably ac- 
cepting of it as a good sign, yea, as already a begin- 
ning of fruit. But in case of peoj)le remaining barren 
after all, the end will be to be cut down. And to every 
fruitless and godless person amongst you, it is not long 
to that day: it will be upon you ere you are aware. 
As John preached, ' the axe is laid to the root of the 
tree ; therefore eveiy tree that bringeth not forth good 
fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire.' God is tak- 
ing his axe, as it were, and fetching his stroke at you ; 

1 Arnot on the Parables, pp. 385, 386. 



THE BARREN FIG-TREE. 289 

and you know not how soon it may light, and you be 
cut down, and cut off from all hopes forever, never to 
see a day of grace more; cut down, and cast into the 
fire to burn, and that never to end. Oh for some soul 
to be rescued, were it even now ! Oh, to-day, to-day, if 
ye will hear his voice, harden not your hearts ! " * Obey 
that call, my brethren, and you need not trouble your- 
selves about the precise position of the limit of God's 
forbearance ; for thereby you will pass at once within 
the circle of his complacency. 

1 Leighton's works, Nelson's edition, p. 547. 



290 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XIX. 
THE GREAT SUPPER. 

(Luke xiv. 16-24.) 

This parable had its occasion in the remark of one, 
who, with a number of like-minded friends, had been 
invited to meet the Saviour, at the table of one of the 
chief Pharisees, on the sabbath day. It seemed a 
courteous kindness to the Lord, to ask him to eat bread 
with such a company ; and yet the spirit at once of the 
host and of the guests is revealed by the Evangelist in 
these words: "it came to pass . . . that they watched 
him." They were not only curious to see what he 
would do, and to hear what he would say ; but they 
were also on the alert to take advantage of any thing 
out of which they might manufacture some accusation 
against him. But the Lord, with that divine tact 
which he invariably manifested, began the attack him- 
self, and, instead of contenting himself with acting on 
the defensive, boldly showed them to themselves with 
such unsparing fidelity, that they were utterly over- 
thrown. Thus when a poor, diseased man came in, 
and made mute appeal for healing, he did not wait to 
be criticised, but " taking the bull by the horns," asked, 
" Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath day ? " and when 
no one ventured to speak, he at once proceeded to cure 
the afflicted one, and sent him away rejoicing. Then, 
marking the jealousies which came out in their contend- 



TT1E GREAT SUPPER. 291 

ings for precedence at the table, lie read them a lecture 
on their conduct, and commended to them that humility 
which was willing to take the lowest place, so that, 
when moved at all, it was moved only to a higher. 
After that, glancing at the appearance of the guests, 
and perceiving that they all belonged to the upper class 
of the population, he recommended them, when they 
made a banquet, to invite those who could not ask them 
to their tables in return, and to look for their recom- 
pense " at the resurrection of the just." Thus he dis- 
armed criticism, and silenced opposition, by addressing 
himself directly to the conscience : thereby setting an 
example which might be profitably followed by his 
ministers, when they find themselves before an audience 
that is watching for an opportunity to trip them up ; 
for conscience rightly addressed is always on the side of 
the preacher, and helps him to a victory. 

In the present instance, all that came out of the 
antagonism of his adversaries was an empty common- 
place, apparently in harmony with what he had been 
saying, but really no more than a bit of conversational 
padding, designed to fill up a somewhat painful pause, 
and meaning nothing in particular. Jesus had said, 
that if they invited to their feasts the poor, the maimed, 
the lame, and the blind, they should be recompensed 
at the resurrection of the just ; and the feeble outcome 
was, that one of his hearers exclaimed, "Blessed is 
he that shall eat bread in the kingdom of God." He 
said nothing, jo\l observe, of the condition on which 
the Lord had declared that they would be recompensed, 
but contented himself with a fervent ejaculation about 
the happiness of those who should feast in the kingdom 
of God ; much as if one, on hearing a present duty faith- 
fully enforced, should indulge in a fervent outburst 



292 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

about the blessedness of heaven. It was pure senti- 
mentalism, holy humbug, or — to use the expressive 
modern word — absolute cant. The man was talking 
about that of which he knew nothing. The kingdom 
of God, in his view, was eating and drinking : and there 
was withal no doubt in his mind that he would be in it. 
But then, it was still a long way off; and this flourish 
about its blessedness might turn the current of conver- 
sation away from the disagreeable channel in which it 
had been flowing. 

Instead of that, however, it only furnished occasion 
for the utterance of this parable, which went still 
deeper in than any thing that had gone before, and 
showed to the whole company the nature of the privi- 
leges which they were at the moment enjoying, and the 
magnitude of the danger in which there and then they 
were standing. This man had spoken of the kingdom 
of God, as if its coming were not to be until the resur- 
rection of the just ; but Jesus shows him that it had 
come already, and that, while they were praising its 
blessedness in the future, they were despising its invi- 
tations in the present. He had also complacently taken 
it for granted, that he would be at the banquet of the 
kingdom ; and Jesus warns him that they who rejected 
its invitations would never taste its provision. 

Thus this also is a parable of warning like that of the 
barren fig-tree ; and it has in it. besides, a predictive ele- 
ment, foretelling, as it does, not only the rejection of the 
Jews, but also the calling of the Gentiles. In many of 
its features, it bears a strong resemblance to the parable 
of the royal marriage-feast, contained in the twenty- 
second chapter of the Gospel by Matthew, which we 
have already considered ; but they are clearly distinct. 
In both, indeed, the gospel blessings are symbolized by 



THE GREAT SUPPER. 293 

a feast, to which men are invited, and from which they 
rudely absent themselves. But this was spoken at an 
early date in the Saviour's ministry : that, in the very 
Passion Week. This, as we have seen, was addressed 
to the guests at a feast : that, probably, in the temple, to 
the multitude. In this, the invited ones are content with 
making excuses : in that, they treat the messengers with 
violence. In this, the despisers of the invitation are 
merely excluded : in that, they are destroyed, and their 
city burned. When this was spoken, the antagonism 
to the Lord had not gained such headway as it had 
acquired when that was uttered, and so it has a milder 
aspect than the other; while the episode of the man 
without the wedding garment has here no place. 
Clearly, then, though similar, they are distinct ; and 
therefore we may be able to bring out the character- 
istic features of that now before us, without going 
over ground which we have already traversed. 

The story may be briefly told as follows : A wealthy 
inhabitant of a great city made preparations for a splen- 
did feast, to which, after the fashion of the country, he 
invited many of his fellow-citizens some time before 
the day which had been fixed for its celebration. Bat 
when the set time came, and the servant was again sent 
forth to remind them of the feast, those who had been 
invited made most frivolous excuses, and declined to 
come ; whereupon the lord of the banquet indignantly 
sent his servant out to bring in from the streets and 
lanes the poor, and the maimed, and the halt, and the 
blind; and when these were not sufficient to fill the 
tables, he commissioned him to go forth again, this time 
outside of the city altogether, to the highways and 
hedges, and to bring in all whom he could find, that 
the house might be crowded; adding, -^ and in this we 



204 TLTE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

have the pith of the story, — "I say unto you, That 
none of those men which were bidden shall taste of my 
supper.'' Now, let us attend to the interpretation ; 
and, that we may not repeat what we have already said 
on the parable of the marriage-feast, we shall take it 
under a series of separate particulars. 

I. There is, first, the feast. This is the gospel which 
God has provided for mankind sinners. Great prepara- 
tion had to be made before it was available for men. 
The law which we had broken had to be satisfied ; the 
penalty which we had incurred had to be endured ; the 
obedience in which we had failed had to be rendered. 
None of these things, however, could be done by man 
for himself. To accomplish them, therefore, it was 
needed that the second in the glorious Trinity should 
take human nature into union with his deity, should 
tabernacle for a season on the earth, should be crucified 
and buried, should rise again from the dead, and enter 
into glory ; and it was on the ground, of the perfection 
and infinite sufficiency of the work of this our Substi- 
tute, that the invitation went forth, " Come, for all 
things are now ready." This was the preparation, and 
the gospel thus procured for us is a feast. 

It is so in respect of the excellence of the provision 
which it sets before us. Pardon of sin, favor with God, 
peace of conscience, renewal of the heart, access to the 
throne of grace, the comforts of the Holy Spirit, the 
exceeding great and precious promises of the Scriptures, 
and a well-grounded hope of eternal life, — these are 
the blessings which crown the gospel board, and they 
are absolutely invaluable. 

It is a feast in respect of abundance, for the supply 
is inexhaustible. On one memorable occasion of which 



TIIE GREAT SUPPER. 295 

we read, the wine began to fail ; and there have been 
repeated instances among men, where the number of 
the guests has more than exhausted the provision which 
had been made for their entertainment: but that has 
never happened, can never happen, here. Numbers 
without number have already partaken of these precious 
blessings ; but they are still as abundant as they were 
at first, for, like the bread that came from the hand of 
Christ upon the mountain-side, they multiply with the 
multitudes that need them, and, after all, there will be 
something over. In our Father's house there is not 
merely^ bread enough, but there is always bread " to 
spare." 

It is a feast in respect of fellowship. Men do not 
make a banquet for solitary enjoyment, but that they 
may have the society of others with them while they 
partake of its rarities. And it is not otherwise here. 
The blessings of the gospel are for social, and not 
simply for private, life ; and what circle of earthly 
friends can be put into comparison with that into 
which we enter when we seat ourselves at the gospel 
table ? There we have communion, not only with the 
best and wisest of earth, but with the redeemed before 
the throne; for 

" The saints on earth, and all the dead, 
But one communion make ; 
All join to Christ, their living Head, 
And of his grace partake." 

We sit down here with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, 
in the kingdom of our Father; yea, our fellowship is 
with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. 

Finally, it is a feast in respect of joy. The giver of it 
and the guests at it rejoice together. The great Father 



296 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

says of eacli redeemed sinner there, " This my son was 
dead, and is alive again ; was lost, and is found." The 
Divine Son sees " of the travail of his soul, and is sat- 
isfied." The Holy Spirit delights in the presence of 
those whom he has renewed and sanctified. And the 
joy of each guest in the possession of the blessings set 
before him is redoubled by the gladness of all the rest ; 
for " true grace hates all monopolies, and loves not to 
eat its morsels alone," but rejoices in the number of 
those who with it are participators in the bounty of 
God. 

Truly, then, may the gospel be symbolized as a 
feast; and as we look upon the provision which God 
has made for all our spiritual wants in Christ, we may 
see the fulfilment of the ancient oracle : " And in this 
mountain shall the Lord of hosts make unto all people 
a feast of fat things, a feast of wines on the lees ; of fat 
things full of marrow, of wines on the lees well re- 
fined." 

II. But now let us look, secondly, at the invited 
guests. In the parable, the servant sent with the first 
invitation stands as the representative of all those who 
were commissioned in God's name and on his behalf to 
the Jews, to prepare them for the advent of the Messiah. 
We must not restrict the reference either to John the 
Baptist, or to any one of the prophets, but must regard 
it as including all who in any way pointed the Jews to 
the coming Deliverer as " the Lamb of God," who was 
to take " away the sin of the world." The servant sent 
at supper-time to say to the invited guests that all 
things were now ready is clearly the Lord Jesus Christ 
himself, whom, when the fulness of the time was come, 
" God sent forth, made of a woman, made under the 



THE GREAT SUrPER. 297 

law, to redeem tliem that were under the law." 2 And 
when the more influential of the Jewish nation ignored 
this invitation, the servant sent forth to the poor and 
maimed and halt and blind, in the streets and lanes of 
the city, represents the Lord Christ and his apostles, 
who turned to the outcast and neglected classes among 
the Jews, — the publicans and sinners, — after their 
message had been repudiated by the spiritual rulers of 
the people ; while he who was commissioned to go out 
to the highways and hedges outside of the city, and 
instructed to compel those whom he found there to 
come in, symbolizes the first preachers of the gospel 
to the Gentiles. The gospel was thus proclaimed first 
to the officials of the Jewish nation, next to the out- 
cast and degraded among the Jews, and finally to the 
Gentiles ; and the fulfilment, or exposition proper, of 
this part of the parable, may be recognized in a moment 
by every intelligent reader of the book of the Acts of 
the Apostles. 

But while this is the literal interpretation of the par- 
able, the point which it is most important for us now to 
remember is, that the invitation to this feast is given 
to every one in whose hearing the gospel is proclaimed. 
That is a great privilege ; but it is also, as we see, a 
great peril, and it becomes us to realize at once the 
advantage and the responsibility of the position in 
which we stand. We have received this invitation, 
" Come, for all things are now ready." To us also it is 
said, " Yet there is room ; " and on us have been put 
forth all those sweetly constraining influences which 
are designed to " compel " men " to come in." This, 
therefore, is not a matter of mere antiquarian interest, 

i Gal. iv. 4, 5. 



298 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

or of curious exegetical importance. It concerns our 
own spiritual and immortal welfare ; for, though, the 
invitation is given through the instrumentality of a 
servant, — the preacher, — it comes from the great God 
himself; and, on that account, it is not to be trifled 
with, or despised. In the court language of Great 
Britain, when a subject receives an invitation to the 
ro} T al table, it is said that her Majesty " commands " his 
presence there. And, similarly, the invitations of the 
King of kings to his gospel banquet are commands, 
the ignoring of which constitutes the most aggravated 
form of disobedience. What, then, shall we do with this 
invitation? That is for us the most important of all 
questions, and ought to have our earliest and most 
devoted attention ; for it is an invitation from God, and 
our answer must be given to him. Remember, then, 
that we have been bidden to this great feast ; and that 
will raise in your view the interpretation of this par- 
able, from a question of curious exposition, up to one 
of personal and eternal importance. 

III. This leads me, however, in the third place, to 
look at the reception given by those first invited, to the 
call which had been addressed to them. " They all 
with one consent began to make excuse." There had 
been no previous understanding between them. They 
did not act as they did, in consequence of any precon- 
certed agreement among themselves. The word "con- 
sent," as you observe, is not in the original; and its 
introduction here is apt to convey an erroneous impres- 
sion. The meaning rather is, that, animated by one 
spirit, moved by one impulse, under the influence of the 
same disposition, they all began to make excuse. What 
that spirit was, is very clear. Each of them considered 



THE GREAT SUPPER. 299 

some worldly thing as of more importance to him than 
the enjoyment of the feast; and that is just saying, in 
another way, that they all treated the invitation as a 
matter of no moment. They did not think it worth 
their while to put themselves to any inconvenience for 
its acceptance. By a little forethought, each of them 
might have made such arrangements as would have 
enabled him to go ; and, if they had cared to be pres- 
ent, they might all have been there with ease. But 
the real truth was, that they did not care to be pres- 
ent ; and that was the secret explanation of their con- 
duct. These excuses, therefore, were all pretexts. They 
were statements of what was true, but they did not 
give a true statement of the whole case. These men 
did not go to the feast, simply because they did not 
care to go. They were in the position of those Jews 
to whom the Lord himself said, " Ye will not come unto 
me, that ye might have life." For, if they had really 
desired to go, none of the things here mentioned would 
have kept them away. Perhaps they deluded them- 
selves into the belief that they were acting in good 
faith; but if they had gone deeper down into their 
hearts, they would have found that they were deceiving 
themselves, and putting forth as excuses things, which, 
if they had been earnestly determined to go to the feast, 
would not have kept them for a moment. 

And their self-delusion, if it were so, was all the more 
insidious because the things which they alleged in excuse 
were all proper enough in themselves, and such as, when 
kept in their own places, no fault could be found with. 
There was no harm in going to see a piece of ground 
which one had bought, or in proving in harness five 
yoke of oxen which one had purchased; and the law 
of Moses gave exemption from liability to military 



300 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUB. 

service to a man for a rear after his marriage. But, 
allowing each of these its clue importance, could any of 
them for a moment be put into comparison with the 
invitation to this banquet ? The proving of the oxen, 
and the seeing of the piece of ground, might well 
enough have been postponed till another day : and no 
bride, worthy of the name, would have objected to the 
absence of her husband for such a great occasion. 
Therefore it is manifest, that, though the statements 
made might all be perfectly true, they were still frivo- 
lous, and altogether inadequate as excuses, betokening 
that those who made them were wedded to other things, 
and cared nothing either for the banquet or its lord. 
Hence we conclude that this part of the parable must 
be read in connection with the twenty-sixth verse of 
this chapter, which almost immediately follows it : " If 
any man come to me, and hate not his father and his 
mother, and wife and children and brethren and sisters. 
yea, and his own life also, he cannot be my disciple."' 
Jesus will have the whole heart. If therefore, it is 
set on any thing else, it cannot be given up to him ; 
and every excuse that is offered for withholding it, 
whether the excuse in itself be true, or not, does not 
give the real reason for his rejection. That must be 
sought in the fact that the heart is set on something 
else, which it is not willing to part with, even for him. 
It is the old story. " One tiling thou lackest;" but that 
one thing is every thing, for it is the love of the heart. 
Let us see to it, therefore, that we keep the heart for 
Christ ; for unless we give him that, we shall never taste 
of his supper. 

IV. But we are thus brought to the fourth thing sug- 
gested by this parable ; namely, that those who persist- 



THE GREAT SUPPER. 301 

ently decline to come to the feast shall be forever ex- 
cluded from its enjoyment. The rejecters of Christ are 
themselves eternally rejected by Christ. The primary 
application of this principle was, of course, to the Jews ; 
for, after they would not receive the Saviour, the apos- 
tles and first preachers of the gospel were commanded 
to turn to the Gentiles. But now the privileges which 
the Jews enjoyed are possessed by the Gentiles, and the 
same principle holds in reference to them ; for, if they 
refuse the invitation to the feast, they too will be ex- 
cluded from it. Privilege thus, as we have so often had 
occasion to remark, involves peril : and if we neglect the 
great salvation, there is not for us, any more than for 
the Jews, any possibility of escape ; for, as one has sol- 
emnly said, the concluding portion of this parable " im- 
plies the impossibility of future restoration of those who 
have received and refused the gospel invitation in this 
life." ! Much has been said in these recent days regard- 
ing the condition of those who pass from earth without 
having heard of Christ and his salvation. But even in 
their case, as I read the New Testament, there is no con- 
tinuance of probation after death ; for the language of 
Paul, " The invisible things of Him from the creation 
of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the 
things which are made, even his eternal power and God- 
head, so that they are without excuse ; " and again, " As 
many as have sinned without law shall also perish with- 
out law," — seems to me conclusive on the subject. But, 
whatever may be said concerning them, there can be no 
hesitation — among those, at least, who receive the state- 
ments of the Lord Jesus Christ himself as authoritative 
— concerning the fate of such as, having heard the gos- 
pel, neglect or despise or reject it. These are terrible 

l Abbott. 



TUE PABABLE.S OF : -1 VIO IE, 

words in themselves ■ -I say unto you, that none of 
those men which were bidden shall taste of my supper," 
but they are yet more terrible as coming from the lips 
of the loving and tender Lord. Jesus. They are like 
the kindred words of the dresser of the vineyard, in the 
parable of the barren fig-tree: "Then, after that, thou 
shalt cut it down." And if that be the sentiment of 
Him who died for men, what man has any right to cavil 
at or condemn it ? Until one is willing to be himself 
crucified for the salvation of those who reject Christ, he 
has no right to find fault with this declaration made by 
Christ. Where shall we find gentleness, self-sacrifice, 
and consideration for the human race, such as Christ has 
manifested? If there had been any possibility of avert- 
ing this doom from impenitent unbelievers, we may be 
sure that he would have availed himself of it on their 
behalf; but if he speaks in this fashion, then their de- 
struction must be inevitable. Yes, and it must be not 
only in harmony with justice, but with love. Now, we 
have heard the gospel, we are constantly hearing it. 
Let us beware, therefore, lest, by neglecting the great 
salvation, we become examples of its terrible realization. 
Think not, I beseech you, to gain admission to the ban- 
quet after the door is shut ; for, has not Christ himself 
said, "Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, 
have we not prophesied in thy name, and in thy name 
have cast out devils, and in thy name done many won- 
derful works ? And then will I profess unto them, I 
never knew you. Depart from me, ye workers of ini- 
quity." 1 Ah ! it is a terrible thing to hear the gospel, 
: do not accept it and obe 

V. Finally, this parable reveals to us the fact that, 
notwithstanding the rejection of this invitation by multi- 

i Matt. viL 22, 23. 



THE GREAT SUPPER. 303 

tudes, God's house shall be filled at last. The servant 
was sent into the streets and lanes of the city, and the 
highways and hedges of the country, to bring men in. 
That, as we have seen, symbolizes the call of the de- 
graded outcasts among the Jews, and, following there- 
upon, the call of the Gentiles at large ; but it implies 
also that the tables shall be furnished with guests. Yes, 
heaven shall be fully occupied with God's redeemed peo- 
ple, and the saved shall not be few. One of the greatest 
of French preachers — Massillon, to wit — has a mar- 
vellous sermon entitled, " On the Small Number of the 
Elect ; " but, in spite of much that is solemn and true in 
the discourse, I cannot agree with the sentiment implied 
in its title. Hitherto, indeed, in the world the Church 
of Christ has been in the minority ; but when the sup- 
per of the Lamb shall be celebrated above, it shall not be 
so. The saved shall vastly, and many times over, out- 
number the lost, and the house of God shall be filled. 
Only the few first stragglers, as it were, from the streets 
and lanes and highways, have yet taken their seats ; but 
the messengers of the Lord of the feast are busy over 
an ever-widening area, carrying the invitation to an ever- 
increasing multitude. Thus far the few only have ac- 
cepted it ; but by and by the nations shall flock in to 
the feast, " as the doves to their windows." When the 
number of the elect shall be accomplished, it shall be 
seen to be. no mere fraction of the race, but the great 
majority of mankind ; and the place of perdition shall be 
to heaven only as the prison is to a populous community. 
Whether, therefore, we be saved or lost, shall make 
little difference, so far as the furnishing of heaven with 
guests is concerned ; but it will make an awful differ- 
ence to us. We shall not be missed, amid the numbers 
without number that people heaven, but oh, how much 



304 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

we shall miss ! God's purpose shall be accomplished, 
whether we accept the invitation of the gospel or not. 
If we accept his grace, it shall be accomplished in our 
salvation ; but if we ignore his invitation, it shall be ac- 
complished in our everlasting exclusion from the feast. 

But why should we thus entail destruction on our- 
selves ? " Yet there is roomy Come, then, my hearer, 
and avail thyself of the gracious opportunity. Once 
again the Saviour says, " Hearken diligently unto me, 
and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight 
itself in fatness. Incline your ear, and come unto me ; 
hear, and your soul shall live : and I will make with 
3< t ou an everlasting covenant, even the sure mercies of 
David." But listen again, for he adds, "Seek ye the 
Lord while he may be found, call ye upon him while he 
is near." 1 There is coming a day when he will not be 
found. The opportunity is precious, but it is fleeting ; 
therefore embrace it while it lasts, — yea, embrace it 
now. 

i Isa. lv. 2, 3, 6 



THE LOST SHEEP, 305 



XX. 1 

THE LOST SHEEP. 

(Luke xv. 1-7.) 

In our exposition of the parable of the great supper, 
we saw that the poor, the maimed, the halt, and the 
blind, in the streets and lanes of the city, to whom 
the lord of the feast sent his invitations to the banquet, 
after the respectable citizens had insulted him with 
their excuses, 'represented the despised classes among 
the Jews, to whom, after he had been treated with con- 
tempt by the scribes and Pharisees, Christ would go 
with his message of salvation. That parable, therefore, 
contained in it a threatening of judgment to the Phari- 
sees, and a promise of mercy to the degraded. 

1 In the summer of 1872, shortly after the beginning of my pastorate 
in New York, I preached a series of six discourses on the fifteenth 
chapter of the Gospel by Luke. These were almost immediately after- 
ward published in a small volume entitled, The Lost Fouud, and the 
Wanderer Welcomed; and of that a new edition was issued from the 
press some two years ago. In view of these facts, my first impulse, 
when I came to this point in my present course of expository sermons 
on the parables of our Lord, was to omit the consideration of this 
chapter altogether. But on mature reflection I have come to the con- 
clusion that it would be a mistake to pass silently over these match- 
less allegories now, merely because I have formerly expounded them. 
I have determined, therefore, to make a re-study of them all, not going 
into such minuteness of detail as I did in the little work to which I 
have referred, but still endeavoring to bring out as distinctly as possible 
the truths which they suggest and illustrate, with such additional light 
as the experience of these intervening years and the illumination of the 
Divine Spirit have given me upon them. 



?>; the paeaiii- :r :ue. 

y . - 

that aire adv. not long after the parable had been deliv- 
ered, its threatening was in conrse of being carried out, 
and its promise in conrse of being fulfilled. The Lord 
had, in a Terr large degree, turned away from the 
exclusive and self-righteons portion of ihe nation, and 
had begun to address Tvmisel: . .. /. : ._t :~t;.: :. 
and despised, with such suece 

•* All the publicans and sinnr: b were 
unto him to hear him/' Nor is it difficult to account 
for their being thus attracted by him. He did not 
despise them as others did; and while Le :.:":: >:rl ;, 
word that could lead them to make light of their sin, 
and his own purity was a constant rr.'tes: sgair_s: :..t:: 
wickedness, yet by his message of salvation he awakened 
hope within them, and by his winnirz '.:~z re 
them after him to follow in his steps He taught them 
to respect themselves, by showing them that they were 
the objects of the Divine solicitude r 1 he iiei; - . :J-err 
to rise above themselves, by breathing his own Spirit 
into them : so that, as they listened to Ms words, they 
too might say, like the officers who, being sent to 
apprehend him, were themselves apprehended by him, 

_ . ~ er man spake like this man." 

But, singularly enough. : h -.- -:::'; 7 : : r ". F juris— = 
who had themselves rejected Jesr= —7:7 :::-':;:::J 
by j_is tenderness :: the - --- wl:z: tley lesiise: 
They would not go in themselves, ye: :re;r —ere irri- 
tated and annoyed 1: sec such persons welcomed by 
the Lord; and they made his treatment of them 1 re~ 
reason for antagonism to him. 1 b 7 1 7 : : 7 they said 
with a sneer, "This m \ receiveth sithtj^tsl, and eateth 
~::ji :iien.*" T'l r . .:... ' :: i: — . > ir 

-- -.:..... . _'. ."- .: :_. L ;: .. ; _'. --■■-_ :_ r r SL.eer. 



THE LOST SHEEP. 307 

uttered in contempt, has become a jewel in the crown 
which now he wears. 

Such exclusiveness as theirs, however, was not to go 
unreproved ; and in order to show them how thoroughly 
they were out of sympathy with the inhabitants of 
heaven, and what like their cold cynicism looked in 
contrast with the welcome which God gives to the 
returning sinner, he spake these three parables, which 
have ever since been regarded by his disciples with 
peculiar interest. Behold how, out of evil, God ever 
bringeth good ! We owe the parable of the prodigal 
son to the taunt of the Pharisees and scribes. The 
sandal needs to be cut in order to give out its richest 
fragrance ; and no diviner words ever issued from the 
Redeemer's lips than these which he spoke in answer 
to a sneer. The cross of Christ was God's reply to the 
world's iniquity, and the story of the prodigal's recep- 
tion is the reproof which Christ administered to the 
contempt of his assailants when they despised him for 
his kindness to the publicans and sinners. 

The parables in this chapter are three, but the pur- 
pose pervading them is one. They were all designed 
to show the Pharisees how unlike God they were in the 
spirit which they manifested when they taunted Jesus 
with the reception of sinners ; and so they all illustrate 
the joy that is in heaven over a penitent's return to 
God. The first two show the scribes and Pharisees 
what they ought to have felt, by describing the joy of 
a shepherd over the recovery of a lost sheep, and the 
joy of a woman at finding a piece of money which she 
had lost ; the third teaches the same lesson by portray- 
ing the happiness of a father in receiving to his home 
again the son whom he had lost, and in the episode of 
the elder brother there is held before the Pharisees a 



SOS THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

faithful mirror in which each one of them might see 
himself. 

But while, undoubtedly, that is the great drift of the 
parables, they, at the same time, teach other correlated 
truths with great power. They all agree in represent- 
ing the sinner as having been lost by God, and in por- 
traying the ecstasy of God on finding him again. But 
the first two show us, in addition, God's search for that 
which he had lost ; while the third sets before us the 
result of that Divine search in the sinner's own return 
to God. The first two have their starting-point in the 
heart of God ; and in them we see the yearning of that 
heart over that which had been lost, prompting him to 
use urgent means for its recovery. The third has its 
starting-point in the heart of the sinner. In it we have 
a picture of his departure, his wandering, his degrada- 
tion, and his return. Thus one in purpose, these par- 
ables are different in detail. But they do not describe 
different classes of sinners, as if some were found by 
God after a long search, and others returned of their 
own accord- to find God for themselves. Rather they 
are different views of what happens at different times 
to the same sinner, and the full truth concerning the 
conversion of any sinner is to be attained by combining 
all the three. Such is the wonderful nature of conver- 
sion, that no one parable can adequately illustrate it; and 
therefore here we have three given us, that, in the union 
of them all, we may have a complete understanding of 
its nature. When the prodigal comes to himself, and 
says, " I will arise and go to my Father," the parable of 
the lost sheep tells us that already the Good Shepherd 
has been there to seek him ; and that of the lost coin 
informs us that already the woman has been there wirh 
her lighted candle and her dislodging broom to seek for 
the piece which she had lost. 



THE LOST SHEEP. 309 

But, leaving these general topics, let us look a little 
at the parable of the lost sheep. It is in itself so simple, 
so natural, and yet so pathetic, that it makes its way at 
once to the heart of every reader. Indeed, it might 
have been often enacted in the pastoral country in 
which it was first spoken ; for its author says, " What 
man of you having an hundred sheep?" and all who 
are familiar with shepherd life will recognize its truth- 
fulness at once. Now, the argument implied in the 
parable is this : If the recovery of a lost sheep is recog- 
nized by you as an event so joyous as to warrant the 
owner of it in calling his friends and neighbors together 
to rejoice with him because he has found it, much more 
is the recovery of a lost soul by God a cause of glad- 
ness to him and all beside him ; and if you do not par- 
ticipate in that delight, then are ye out of harmony 
with the inhabitants of heaven, among whom " there is 
joy over one sinner that repenteth." It is an argument 
from the less to the greater, having as its suppressed 
premise the question once before upon the lips of the 
Lord, "How much is a man better than a sheep?" and 
its reference to the joy of the heavenly inhabitants was 
a reproof — all the stronger because it was a tacit one 
— of the cynicism of the scribes and Pharisees over his 
reception of publicans and sinners. 

But, while that is the main lesson and proper inter- 
pretation of the parable, there are many other things in 
it which cannot be neglected without serious loss. Let 
us, therefore, examine it more carefully. 

I. And first let me ask you to look at the loss. " What 
man of you, if he lose one sheep." We have here viv- 
idly set before us the fact that the sinner has been lost 



310 TUE PARABLES OE QUE SAVIOUR. 

by God. Usually in the exposition of this parable, so 
far as it refers to the sinner, attention is directed t : 
hapless condition. We are reminded of the helpless- 
D ss of the wandered sheep, running hither and thither, 
"bleating up the moor in weary dearth." and ever liable 
to be assailed by wild beasts, or to fall headlong >vei 
some rugged precipice, or into some fearful pit : and we 
are told that in all this we hare a picture of the sinner, 
who has gone away from God. and cannot find his way 
back, while he is a prey to spiritual adversaries of every 
sort. Xow, that is all true : but it is not the truth 
taught here. For the loss here is sustained not by the 
sinner, but by God: and in that fact we have the infinite 
pathos of these parables. He is the shepherd whose 
sheep has wandered off. Re is the woman whose 2 Mfi 3e 
of money has disappeared in the darkness and If: 
the house ; Sa is the father whose son has gone away, 
and become lost to him. Now, I know that it is perilous 
to press a human analogy to its utmost, when we are 
speaking about God. I admit also, that, strictly speak- 
ing, God cam: : " e said to lose any thing. But still, 
somewhere and somehow, the figure of these parables has 
a real significance. We can not, we dare not. eliminate 
from this losing of the sheep, of the money, of the son. 
all reference to the feelings of Gk :1 toward the sinner. 
They mean. that, in the separation between him and 
the man, which sin has caused, Jehovah has lost some- 
thing which he had formerly possessed, and highly 
valued. They mean, that, to God. the sinner is as 
something lost is to him to whom it belonged; and 
these parables let us see how anxious he is. and what 
efforts he will make, to regain it for his own. At first 
there was a human voice in the choral anthem of his 
praise ; but when man sinned, that voice dropped out, 



THE LOST SHEEP. 311 

and He marked its absence with as much of sadness as 
Deity can feel. Nay, there was a special reason why 
God should miss human allegiance, even though, in 
other respects, its loss should seem no greater than that 
of one sheep out of a hundred ; for man alone, of all 
his creatures, was formed in God's image. In him alone 
could Jehovah see the complete, though miniature, rep- 
resentation of himself ; but when he sinned, that image 
was defaced, and God lost that which was to him so 
dear. Or, to put it more simply, when man fell, God 
lost the honor and service of human lives, the affection 
of human hearts, and the joy of human fellowship. 

Nor let it be supposed, that, in giving prominence to 
this thought, I am insisting on something which is of 
no importance ; for in this feeling of loss on the part of 
God, I find the explanation of the great sacrifice which 
he has made for human redemption. We do not like 
to lose any thing. No matter how apparently trivial 
that which we have lost may be, we will search again 
and again before we give it up as irrecoverable ; and 
the more we value it, the more earnest will be our quest. 
If it be an animal, or a sum of money, we will go hither 
and thither ourselves, and engage others in the search, 
that by all means we may be successful. If it be a son, 
all the depths of our hearts will be stirred within us as 
we set out to track his wanderings ; and we will never 
give up our efforts until we come either on himself or 
on his grave. Now, there must be something like that 
in God ; for he has made us in his own image. I say 
not, indeed, that the loss of his human children caused 
him positive unhappiness ; and yet, after all, why need 
I be so chary? Do not the Scriptures speak of him as 
grieved? Do they not represent him as soliloquizing 
thus: "How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? How 



312 THE PABABLES OF OUR SAVIOUB. 

shall I deliver thee, Israel ? How shall I make thee as 
Admah? How shall I set thee as Zeboim? Mine 
heart is turned within me, my repentings are kindled 
together." * Let me take courage, then, and say, that, 
feeling the loss which he had sustained in being deprived 
of man's affection and obedience, God yearned in eager 
earnestness for the recovery of that which he so missed. 
We can speak of God only in human words, and these 
must lose some of their earthly meaning when applied 
to him. Nevertheless, it standeth here most sure, that, 
when man sinned, God lost that which he valued very 
greatly ; and that the sense of this loss impelled him to 
seek after the salvation of sinners. " He so loved the 
world, that he gave his only begotten Son." What is 
that but just another way of saying that he so missed 
man's affection and fellowship, that he gave his only 
begotten Son? He sought our salvation not merely 
for our sakes, but also for his own ; and thus the con- 
sciousness of loss corresponds, at the one end of the 
matter, with the rapturous joy which is felt at the other 
when the sinner repenteth. 

This view of the subject may well give careless sin- 
ners food for serious reflection. You are God's. As his 
creatures, yea, as his sons, you are his. But you have 
gone away from him after your own paths, seeking your 
own ends ; and he misses you. He on whom the uni- 
verse depends, and who, it might be supposed, cares 
nothing about you, — he misses you. He yearns for 
your affection. He desires your return. Yea, he has 
used means of the most costly sort to find you out, and 
to bring you back. Why will you continue to be indif- 
ferent to him ? Why will you perversely misrepresent 
him as one who takes no interest whatever in your wel- 

i Hos. xi. 8. 



THE LOST SHEEP. 313 

fare? Believe me, you can give him no higher joy than 
by returning unto him, while at the same time your 
repentance will secure your own eternal happiness. 

II. But it is time now to look at the search and 
recovery. " Doth he not leave the ninety and nine in 
the wilderness, and go after that which is lost until he 
find it? and when he hath found it he layefch it on his 
shoulders rejoicing." Many questions rise out of these 
words, which are more easily asked than answered. 
Whom do these ninety and nine represent? What is 
meant by the leaving of them, and going after that which 
is lost? and when may the lost be said to be truly 
found? The ninety and nine are said, in the seventh 
verse, to be "just persons which need no repentance." 
Now, some have supposed that there is here a reference 
to the Pharisees and scribes. They would make it an 
ironical expression like that other, " They that are 
whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. I 
came not to call the righteous, but sinners, to repent- 
ance ; " 1 and they would interpret the leaving of the 
ninety and nine as a vindication of himself by Jesus 
for leaving the exclusive and self-righteous and going 
after publicans and sinners. This gives a good and 
consistent enough meaning, and I have been greatly 
inclined to adopt it as correct ; yet two reasons weigh 
with me so strongly as to lead me to prefer another. 
These are : First, it is positively said here that these 
ninety and nine need no repentance : therefore it is 
implied that they have never sinned. Second, it is 
affirmed that " joy shall be in heaven over one sinner 
that repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just 
persons which need no repentance : " therefore it is im- 

i Matt. ix. 12. 



31 -1 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

plied that there is some joy over the ninety and nine. 
But that cannot be true if they represent the Pharisees, 
since it is impossible to conceive that any inhabitant of 
heaven could rejoice in any degree over them. There- 
fore, although the view which I prefer is not without its 
own serious difficulties, I am disposed to regard the 
ninety and nine as descriptive of the angels who have 
kept their first estate, and who ceaselessly serve God 
before his throne. 

If, then, that representation be correct, the leaving 
of the ninety and nine will signify the leaving of heaven 
by the eternal Son, when, at the era of the incarnation, 
he who was " rich, for our sakes became poor," * and set 
out in search of that which was lost. And the search 
itself will include every thing which the Lord Jesus 
did by his own personal ministry on earth, by his death, 
resurrection, and ascension, and by the mission of his 
Spirit, as well as every thing which he is now doing by 
the preaching and labors of his ministers, for the re- 
covery of sinners. All the way from the bosom of the 
Father to the tomb of Joseph, Jesus came to seek and 
to save that which was lost; and while that was the 
goal which he had in view at the last, he was all the time 
giving illustrations of his great work as he went along. 
He was seeking his sheep which he had lost, when he 
sat by the well of Sychar, and talked with the woman 
of Samaria ; when he called Zacchseus down from his 
perch among the leaves of the sycamore-tree ; and when 
he bade Matthew follow him from his toll-booth. He 
died that the path might be opened up for him to go 
farther still in his loving search ; and he had the same 
object in view when he shed forth his Spirit on the day of 
Pentecost, and inspired his servants to proclaim his truth 

i 2 Cor. viii. 9. 



THE LOST SHEEP. 315 

with power. He has been continuing his search ever 
since : and still in the events of his providence, whereby 
he rouses the careless to reflection ; in the labors of his 
ministers, who proclaim his message, and speak to the 
hearts of their fellow-men ; and in the strivings of his 
Spirit, whereby often, when they can give no explana- 
tion of the matter, men's minds are strangely turned in 
the direction of salvation, — he is going after that which 
was lost. Yea, he is here to-night prosecuting his 
search, as once again, through the exposition of this 
parable, his love and earnestness and tenderness are 
set before us. Nor will his search be concluded until 
time shall be no longer. Oh ! in view of this unceasing 
work of the Good Shepherd, may we not sing, in the 
words of the old hymn, — 

" Wearily for me thou soughtest, 
On the cross my soul thou boughtest, 
Lose not all for which thou wroughtest " ? 

But when is a sinner found by Christ ? The answer 
is : when, on his side, the sinner finds Christ. The find- 
ing of the lost sheep is, as you see, spoken of in the 
parable as corresponding with the repenting of the sin- 
ner. When, therefore, the sinner turns to God, he is 
found and recovered by God ; or, borrowing here a side 
light from the third parable in this chapter, when the 
prodigal comes to himself, and says, " I will arise and 
go to my Father," he is precisely at the point indicated 
in the first parable by the shepherd's finding his sheep 
and laying it on his shoulder. What is seen from the 
heavenly side is Christ laying his hand upon the sinner 
as he says, " I have found that which was lost ; " but 
what is seen from the earthly side is the sinner laying 
his hand on Christ as he exclaims, " I have found my 



316 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

deliverer." Yet these are not two things so much as 
different sides of the same thing, and they are both 
present in every conversion. Nor must we lose sight 
of the tenderness of the Good Shepherd as he is here 
described. He does not strike the sheep, or speak to it 
in words of harshness ; but he lifts it gently on to his 
own shoulders, and carries it back to the flock. So it is 
with Jesus and the sinner. He does not upbraid him 
with his waywardness and folly ; he does not cast his 
ingratitude and disobedience in his teeth: but with 
gentleness he receives him to his heart, and fills him 
with happiness and joy. " A bruised reed shall he not 
break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench." x 
You need not be afraid of him, O sinner ; for he is say- 
ing to you now, " Come unto me, and I will give you 
rest." 

III. The last thing in the parable is the joy over the 
recovery of that which had been lost. " And when he 
cometh home he calleth together his friends and neigh- 
bours, saying unto them : Rejoice with me, for I have 
found my sheep which was lost. I say unto you, that 
likewise joy shall be in heaven over one sinner that 
repenteth, more than over ninety and nine just persons 
which need no repentance." The home-coming here 
can hardly be identical with the finding of the lost one, 
but must rather be understood of the introduction of 
the saved one into heaven at last. Yet the joy over his 
recovery is not delayed till then, though then it shall 
be intensified and increased. An illustration may make 
this perfectly rjlain. Suppose that one of your children 
has wandered away from home, and that a trusted mem- 
ber of your family has set out in search of him. He is 

1 Isa. xlii. 3. 



THE LOST SHEEP. 317 

away a long time, and your heart grows weary as it looks 
for tidings day after day in vain. At length there comes 
a telegram from a distant city with the information that 
the lost one has been found, and that both will be home 
again ere long. Of course the mere receipt of that 
message gives you joy, irrepressible and ecstatic. But 
when the loved one enters your dwelling once again, 
your joy becomes more emphatic and demonstrative 
than ever. Now, your gladness at the receipt of the 
telegram corresponds to the joy that is in heaven over 
a sinner's repentance; while your higher delight over 
the reception of your child into your home symbolizes 
the joy which shall be felt when the saved sinner is 
received into glory. 

But why should there be more joy over the repenting 
sinner than over the unfallen angels ? The question is 
important, for that is the chief point of difference be- 
tween the first and second parables here. As we shall 
see when we come to it, the joy of the woman in the 
next parable demands society to make it complete, 
even as it is said here that the shepherd calleth "to- 
gether " his friends and neighbors ; but in the moral of 
that parable this general joy is brought into promi- 
nence, whereas in that of this one it drops out of notice, 
and stress is laid mainly on the fact that the joy is 
greater over the recovery of the lost than over the 
retention of the unfallen. And to understand how that 
may be, we have but to recall familiar experiences of 
our own. The mother regards with a peculiar interest 
the child that has been nigh, unto death and brought 
back again as from the grave. The greater the peril 
one has passed through, the greater the joy over his 
ultimate safety. One Bible has as much in it as another, 
and to the devout soul any copy of the Scriptures will 



318 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

be an object of interest; but I am sure Dr. Andrew 
Bonar regards with special delight that Bible which he 
accidentally let fall into Jacob's well, and which, after 
having been for long years lying there, was at length 
fished up and restored to him by his friend Dr. Wilson 
of Bombay. A ship-launch is a glad occasion ; and as 
the crowds behold the vessel, gayly decked with flags, 
slip down the ways into the water, they rend the 
air with cheers; but there is another kind of joy in 
the hearts of those whose loved ones have been on 
board a steamship that is long overdue and has been 
given up for lost, when she is signalled off the port, 
and they hasten down to the wharf to receive those for 
whom they had almost mourned as for the dead. Such 
experiences as these, human though they be, may help 
us to understand the joy that is in heaven, and chiefest 
of all there in the heart of God himself, over one sinner 
that repenteth. Such a joy, O sinner, you may occa- 
sion there. Repent, therefore, now: and as the news 
is told on high, a thrill of gladness will vibrate in the 
hearts of the redeemed; angels will share the high 
delight, and God himself will own the rapture of the 
moment as he says, "This my son was dead, and is 
alive again : he was lost, and is found." 

I conclude with the repetition of one of the most 
touching lyrics founded on this parable which I have 
seen, though my imperfect acquaintance with the dialect 
of the colored people, in which it is written, may prevent 
you somewhat from feeling the power of its exquisite 

pathos. 

De massa ob de sheepfoP, 
Dat guards de sheepfol' bin, 
Look out in de gloomerin' meadows 
Wha'r de long night rain begin : 
So he call to de hirelin' shepa'd, — 
" Is my sheep, is dey all come in ? " 



THE LOST SHEEP. 319 

Oh, den says de hirelin' shepa'd, 
" Des's some, dey's black and thin, 
And some, dey's po' ol' wedda's, 
But de res' dey's all brung in, — 
But de res' dey's all brung in." 

Den de massa ob de sheepfol', 

Dat guards de sheepfol' bin, 

Goes down in de gloomerin' meadows, 

Whar de long night rain begin ; 

So he le' down de ba's ob de sheepfol', 

Callin' sof ', " Come in, come in," — 

Callin' sof, " Come in, come in ! " 

Den up fro' de gloomerin' meadows, 
T'ro' de col' night rain and win', 
And up t'ro' de gloomerin' rain-paf 
Wha'r de sleet fa' pie'cin' thin, 
De po' los' sheep ob de sheepfol' 
Dey all comes gadderin' in, — 
De po' los' sheep ob de sheepfol' 
Dey all comes gadderin' in. 



THE F ARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XXI. 

THE LOST COIN. 

(Luke xv. 8-10.) 

The story told in these verses is thoroughly true to 
Eastern life. Even to this day, as I have been informed 
by one, who, from long residence among them, is per- 
fectly familiar with the domestic habits of the people 
of Palestine, the cherished heirlooms of a Syrian woman 
consist, for the most part, in pieces of money. They 
are her own exclusive property, with which her husband 
may not interfere ; and, having descended to her from 
her mother, they are handed down by her in turn to 
her daughters. They are commonly worn in the hair, 
the larger pieces generally hanging from the ends of the 
braids. Thus one might easily fall out of its place ; 
and, if it did so, it could not be recovered without a 
search. 

For there was not in Eastern dwellings, in the 
Saviour's day, the same scrupulous attention to cleanli- 
ness that we love to see in so many homes among our- 
selves. The floors were frequently covered with rushes, 
which, being changed only at rare intervals, collected a 
vast amount of dust and debris, among which a coin 
might be very readily lost. Add to this, that Eastern 
houses are constructed in such a way as to keep out the 
light and heat of the sun as much as possible. Dr. 
Edward Robinson speaks of his having passed a night 



THE LOST COIN. 321 

in the Lebanon, in a house in which there was "no 
window, and no light except from the door ; " * and, in 
general, the windows are few, while even these are 
shaded with such lattice-work as tends to exclude rather 
than admit the light. Hence when a comparatively 
small article, like a piece of money, was lost in such a 
place, the lighting of a lamp, and the sweeping of the 
house, were the most natural means to be used for its 
recovery. Moreover, as the coin formed presumably a 
part of the dowry of the woman, in which all her 
descendants had an interest as well as herself, we can 
easily understand how its loss and recovery would be 
almost equally an object of interest to them all. It 
was quite natural, therefore, for her to call her female 
friends and neighbors, — for so the phrase is in the 
Greek, — to rejoice with her over the finding of her 
lost heirloom ; for they, as having similar treasures ex- 
posed to similar dangers, would be able to enter fully 
into her feelings. 

The parable is thus realistically true, even in its 
minutest details ; while yet it has in it that idealistic 
universality which makes every reader feel that it might 
have happened to himself. It is a painting of an inte- 
rior, such as Wilkie and Teniers loved to portray, with 
this added feature, that we have here the motion and 
progress, which no picture can reproduce ; while it is 
all so natural, that we seem for the time to be ourselves 
taking part in the search, and joining in the gladness 
wherewith its success is celebrated. 

But beautiful as it is, even as a picture, this parable 
is - no less striking as the material analogy of the spirit- 
ual truth with which the Saviour was dealing when he 
spake it at the first. It carries its interpretation on its 

1 Biblical Researches, vol. iii. p. 44. 



322 TUE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

fa eo ; and is in the main a repetition, with emphasis, of 
the parable of the lost sheep. Both of them set before 
ns a loss, a search, a recovery, and a resultant joy. In 
both the argument is from the less to the greater; and 
in both the application is to the objection which the 
Pharisees and scribes raised against Christ for receiving 
sinners, and eating with them. The lesson plainly is, 
that, if a woman has such gladness over the finding of 
a lost piece of money that she cannot but call upon 
her friends and neighbors to rejoice with her, much 
more ought all right-thinking persons to rejoice with 
God over the recovery of lost sinners. And that joy 
is felt among the inhabitants of heaven, over one sinner 
that repenteth. 

This is the full exposition of the parable. But to 
enforce that would be only to repeat what we have 
already advanced in our consideration of the story of 
the lost sheep ; and therefore to-night we shall turn 
your attention to some things suggested here, which, 
though not strictly and properly belonging to exposi- 
tion, may yet fairly enough find a place in the homiletic 
treatment of the subject, provided it be clearly under- 
stood that we regard them, not as a part of the inter- 
pretation of the parable, but simply as edifying truths, 
which are recalled to our minds by the special features 
of the story itself. 

I. Look, then, first, at the thing lost. It was a coin. 
It was not simply a piece of precious metal, but that 
metal moulded and minted into money. You remember 
how, when the enemies of Jesus sought to insnare him 
by asking whether it was lawful to give tribute to 
Csesar or not, he said to them, " Show me a penny ; " 
and when one had been produced, he asked, " Whose is 



THE LOST COIN. 323 

this image and superscription?" They replied, "Cae- 
sar's." Whereupon he answered, "Render therefore 
unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and to God 
the things which are God's." * Now, reading this par- 
able in the light of that narrative, we think of the coin 
as stamped with the king's image, and designed not only 
for a medium of exchange, but also for a testimony to 
the royalty and right of him whose likeness was im- 
pressed upon it. What a beautiful thing is a new piece 
of money ! How sharply cut are the letters which are 
imprinted on it ! How finely relieved the likeness of 
the monarch ! And how bright its polished surface ! 
Can we help being reminded by all this of the human 
soul, when first it came new-minted from the Creator's 
hand ? It had enstamped upon it his image in knowl- 
edge, righteousness, and holiness, and was designed by 
him to be a willing witness-bearer to the rightfulness 
of his authority and the stability of his throne. He 
made man after his own likeness, and this coin in its 
original condition may image forth to us the human soul 
in its primal dignity and beauty. 

But the coin was lost, and that may suggest to us that 
the great purpose for which man was created has been 
missed by the sinner. For any good which the piece of 
money, so long as it was lost, was to its owner, it might 
as well have been non-existent. And similarly the sin- 
ner is, so to say, of no use to God. He gives no glory 
to God ; he is of no service to him, so far, at least, as 
the promotion of his honor and the acknowledgment 
of his authority are concerned. He does not " like to 
retain God" in his knowledge. His heart is estranged 
from God's love; his life is devoted to another lord: 
he is lost. 

i Luke xx. 24, 25. 



3:24 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

Yet he is not absolutely worthless ; for the coin, 
though lost, has still a value. If it can be recovered, it 
will be worth as much as ever. It may be blackened 
with rust, or soiled with mud, or covered over with 
dust ; but it is still silver, — nay, it is still minted silver. 
Even so the human soul is valuable though lost. It 
has in it the silver of immortality ; and, depraved though 
it be, its intellectual powers, its moral freedom, its soar- 
ing ambition, and its upbraiding conscience tell not 
only of its former grandeur, but also of its present im- 
portance. Sinful as he is, man is the most valuable 
being in the world. There is nothing equal to him ; 
nothing, almost, that we can name as second after him. 
There is a wide, yawning, impassable gulf between him 
and the highest of the lower animals. He has a dignity 
to which they can lay no claim. He has a character 
which is unique and peculiar to himself. In spite of 
modern theories of development, there is in every 
human being a moral nature which marks him man and 
not brute, together with such feelings after the future 
life as stamp him immortal; and this is the silver of 
the coin that once bore, distinct and well defined, the 
lineaments of Jehovah's image. 

But the coin may he recovered, for it was lost in the 
house. The woman did not let it fall as she was cross- 
ing the wild and trackless moor, neither did she drop it 
into the depths of the Galilsean lake. Had she done 
either, she would never have thought of seeking for it, 
for she would have regarded it as irrecoverable. But 
knowing that it had fallen from her in the house, and 
that it must be somewhere within its walls, she made 
vigorous search in the certainty that it could be found. 
Now, that reminds us that the soul of the sinner is 
recoverable by God. It is capable of being restored to 



THE LOST com. 325 

its original dignity and purity. It has in it still possi- 
bilities as great and glorious as ever. 

There are many things which are to human view 
irremediable, and must be left as they are. No human 
alchemy can bleach into its primal whiteness the black- 
ened snow which has been trodden into miry slush 
upon the city streets. No artistic ingenuity can replace 
the downy skin upon the peach which has been rubbed 
against the ragged wall. No manufacturing skill can 
restore to the violet the velvet softness of its leaf after 
it has been crumpled up and withered. But the soul 
of man, even in its most depraved condition, is capable of 
being renewed, and may yet become a pure and holy den- 
izen of heaven. For "who are these in white robes? 
and whence came they ? " These are " they who have 
washed their robes, and made them white in the blood 
of the Lamb," souls renewed by the power of God's 
Spirit, through the work of his Son. The lost sinner, 
therefore, may be recovered. So no one needs despair, 
or think that he is beyond the possibility of salvation ; 
neither should any one among us regard the most 
abandoned as hopeless : for the coin went a-missing, not 
in the dark depths of the inaccessible ravine, but within 
the four walls of the house. What an antidote to per- 
sonal despondency, and what a spur to flagging energy 
in our efforts for the benefit of others, have we in this 
delightful thought ! 

II. But now let us look at the search, and we may 
find some equally important truths recalled by that to 
our remembrance. The loser here is also the seeker; 
and, as it was natural that the shepherd should go after 
his sheep, it is equally natural, that, in this case, the 
woman should make search for the coin. We may not, 



326 TIIE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

therefore, press into undue significance the fact that 
prominence is given here to a woman, or seek to bring 
more out of the parable than it really contains. Yet it 
is hardly possible, for me at least, to read it, in the con- 
nection in which here it stands, without having recalled 
to my mind the agency of the Holy Spirit in the con- 
version of a soul. In the first of the parables, the 
shepherd reminds us of Him who is emphatically the 
Good Shepherd; and we had no hesitation in applying 
what is said there to his seeking and saving that which 
was lost. In the third of the parables, the reception of 
the prodigal by his father connects itself, in the mind 
of every reader, with the loving Fatherhood of God, as 
manifested in the welcome which he gives to the return- 
ing sinner. And therefore there' is no impropriety in 
associating what is here said of the woman, with the 
agency of the Holy Spirit in the recovery of a sinful 
soul. Mr. Arnot, indeed, will not allow us to take 
such a view, even though we do not put it forward as 
involved in the proper interpretation of the parable. 
He affirms, that, since the shepherd who lost the sheep 
represents the Lord Jesus, the woman who lost the piece 
of money must represent him too. But if that argu- 
ment have any force, then we must go farther, and 
affirm that the father who lost his son must also repre- 
sent Christ. But that is a view which no one will 
accept. The truth is, that which was lost, whether we 
call it sheep, or coin, or son, represents the sinner who 
was lost by the Godhead; and if in the shepherd we 
are reminded of the Son, and in the father we have 
God the Father suggested to us, there can surely be no 
impropriety in hinting that the action of this woman 
may remind us of the work of the Holy Ghost in the 
regeneration of a sinner. 



THE LOST COIN. 327 

This woman lighted a lamp, and swept the house, 
and searched diligently until she found the piece which 
she had lost. Now, the lighting of the lamp suggests 
to us the illuminating agency of the Spirit in bringing 
the truth to bear upon the soul. The truth which he 
employs for the conversion of a sinner is the word of 
God, all of which has been given by his own inspira- 
tion ; and the special portion of that word which he 
uses in his saving work is the wondrous story of the 
cross. " The truth as it is in Jesus ; " the fact, that 
" God so loved the world, that he gave his only be- 
gotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should 
not perish, but have everlasting life ; " x the faithful 
saying that " Christ Jesus came into the world to save 
sinners," 2 — this is the light which he employs. No 
new revelations does he now bestow. He uses still this 
old gospel, — the good news of salvation through Him 
" who died for our offences, and rose again for our justi- 
fication." In a word, the truths which centre in the 
cross of Calvary are those which the Spirit employs for 
the conversion of men. It was so on the day of Pente- 
cost ; it has been so in every period of true spiritual 
revival ; it has been so in every individual conversion. 
They say that in some of our large millinery establish- 
ments many needles are lost in the course of the day ; 
and that, in seeking to recover them, a young woman, 
instead of going down upon the carpet, and wearifully 
picking them up one by one, takes a powerful magnet, 
and, holding it near the floor, goes all around the room, 
attracting to it each minutest particle of steel, and so 
recovering all. So, in searching for lost souls, the 
Holy Spirit goes through the world, employing the mag- 
net of the cross. Everywhere he seeks to draw men to 

1 John iii. 16. 2 i Tim. i. 15. 



328 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

him by the attraction of his love, and constrains them 
" to live by the faith of Him who loved them, and gave 
himself for them." 

But not all at once, — at least, as a general rule, — do 
men attend to and believe this truth of the gospel. The 
magnet will do its work wherever there are no neutral- 
izing elements near ; but so long as the soul is sunk in 
depravity, or engaged in worldly pleasures, or absorbed 
in earthly pursuits, it feels not the charm of the 
Redeemer's love. Hence means must be used to de- 
stroy the counter attractions of the world, which keep 
men from being sensitive to the love of Christ. Or, 
taking our language from the parable, if the light of 
the lamp fall immediately upon the coin, it is then and 
thereby found ; but if the piece of money, having been 
dropped on a rush-covered floor, has rolled away, and 
become covered by the straw and debris of weeks, these 
must be removed before the light can reveal it to the 
seeker's eye. But then comes the sweeping of the house. 
There are providential disturbances in business, or there 
are family bereavements or personal afflictions, or there 
is the awakening of the conscience by the hearing of 
some solemn discourse ; and, as the result of these or 
of some other of the manifold expedients which God 
the Holy Spirit can employ, there is a general upturn- 
ing of the soul, like that which is created in the home 
by the annual house-cleaning ; and, just as, on such 
occasions, many things which had been hidden for a 
long time come out into view, and compel you to settle 
what you will do with them, so, in the soul's disturb- 
ance, the long-neglected questions about sin and salva- 
tion come up, and the man is impelled to cry, " What 
must I do to be saved?" Then, as some Evangelist 
exclaims, " Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou 



THE LOST COIN. 329 

shalt be saved," he turns in penitence and faith to the 
Redeemer ; and that moment the Holy Spirit finds and 
recovers the lost soul. 

In this view of the case, then, every time a sinner is 
brought face to face with trial, every providential un- 
settlement that disturbs him, or, to use Jeremiah's 
expression, every " emptying from vessel to vessel " 1 to 
which he is subjected, is a new sweeping of the house 
by the Holy Spirit in his search after him for his salva- 
tion. Do not, I beseech you, O sinner ! misunderstand 
God's dealings with you in these dispensations. The 
more severe they are, they are only the more impressive 
revelations of his earnestness in seeking for your high- 
est welfare. They are but, as it were, the result of his 
diligence in searching after you ; and, if now this is 
revealed to you for the first time, oh, let him find you 
as, with devout reverence and genuine repentance, you 
exclaim, " Lord, I believe : help thou mine unbelief," 

III. Turning now to the joy over the recovered coin, 
we find here one of the distinctive features of this par- 
able. In the story of the lost sheep, while the social 
character of the shepherd's gladness is certainly referred 
to, the specialty of his delight lay in the fact, to which 
prominence is given in the appended note of interpreta- 
tion, that it was greater than over the ninety and nine 
which had never gone astray. Here, however, the em- 
phasis is laid on the circumstance that the woman 
" called together her friends and neighbors, saying, Re- 
joice with me ; for I have found the piece which I had 
lost," while no reference is made to the nine pieces 
which she had always possessed ; and the note of expo- 
sition simply reads, " Likewise I say unto you, There is 

1 Jer. xlviii. 11. 



830 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

joy in the presence of the angels of God" — that is, 
substantially, in the hearts of God and of his angels 
— "over one sinner that repenteth." We have seen 
already, in our introductory remarks, how it came that 
the woman's female friends were likely to have special 
sympathy with her in her delight. But gladness every- 
where is diffusive . We cannot have the highest kind 
of joy if we must keep it to ourselves. There are cer- 
tain sorrows which must find vent in tears, else death 
will be the result ; and in this connection we must all 
remember the words in Tennyson's beautiful song, 
" She must weep, or she will die." But there is some- 
thing similar, also, with the opposite emotion of delight. 
There are joys which, if we may not share them with 
others, will seriously injure ourselves. The pent-up 
feeling will choke us ; but the expression of it to others 
will give relief to ourselves, while, if they are in any 
way like-minded with us, or deeply interested in our 
welfare, it will make them also sharers of our ecstasy. 
Nor is this all : the sight of their gladness will redouble 
our own, and add to our permanent happiness. Every 
reader of ancient history remembers the " Heureka " of 
Archimedes after his great discovery ; and there is prob- 
ably no one among ourselves, who has not had times in 
his own experience, when, eager for sympathy in his 
joy, he has gone long miles to make it known to those 
who would understand and participate in his delight. 
We want to be congratulated by those who can appre- 
ciate and intelligently join with us in the gladness of 
the hour. 

Now, here, again, we find in ourselves a feature of 
our resemblance to God. For his joy also, if I may ven- 
ture to say so, needs society to give it perfection ; and 
the fact that there are those beside him to whom he 



THE LOST COIN. 331 

can make known the story of each repenting sinner, 
and who, in some degree, realize the occasion of his 
delight, intensifies his gladness, and diffuses among 
them a new happiness. The celestial inhabitants who 
share with God his joy over a repenting sinner are the 
holy angels ; part of whose education, if I may so say, 
consists in their perception of the gradual development 
of the Divine plan for the salvation of men, and the 
continued evidence of its success. Nor let any one 
suppose that this is a mere fancy of our own, for which 
there is no foundation in Scripture apart from the words 
of this parable ; for Paul has said that " God hath cre- 
ated all things by Jesus Christ, to the intent that now 
unto the principalities and powers in heavenly places, 
might be made known, through the church, the manifold 
wisdom of God." 1 Now, as the church exists in the 
world for the salvation of men, these words must mean 
that through it God is showing, in the recovery of human 
souls, his manifold wisdom to the principalities and 
powers of heaven ; and that in the appreciation of his 
success, by those who know something of the difficulties 
with which he had to contend, and which he overcame, 
he has his highest joy. When Sir William Thomson let 
down his grappling apparatus from the deck of the 
" Great Eastern," into the dark depths of the Atlantic, 
and succeeded in bringing up therewith the cable which 
years before had been lost, there was, we may be sure, 
a thrill of unutterable gladness in his own heart ; but 
when his fellow-electricians, who understood so well 
what skill was needed to devise the means which he had 
used, crowded round him to express their great delight, 
nothing more was needed to make his joy complete. So, 
if we may compare human things with divine, the per- 

i Eph. iii. 9, 10. 



332 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

ception of his wisdom in the means which he has devised 
for the recovery of lost men, and the appreciation of his 
success in the use of those means, by the principalities 
and powers of heaven who are nearest him, and know 
him best, is the very acme of the Divine delight ; and we 
can well understand how Paul, in speaking of the way 
of salvation, calls it " the glorious gospel of the happy 
God." 1 For it is not only a revelation of his glory, but 
also a minister to his happiness. But I can go no far- 
ther here ; and I must leave it to yourselves, under the 
guidance of the Holy Spirit, to think out the thought 
to which I have given such stammering and hesitating 
utterance. Yet, if I have in any degree brought out 
to you the meaning of the Saviour's words, what an 
overwhelming rebuke it was to the Pharisees, to be 
shown how utterly out of sympathy they were with 
God and his angels when they sneered at Jesus for re- 
ceiving sinners and eating with them ! The highest in 
the celestial principalities would have counted it an 
honor to be employed in just such work as Jesus was 
performing, and they were even at the moment con- 
templating it with sympathetic interest ; while the scribes 
— for all so righteous as they thought themselves — 
stood by and sneered. My brethren, let us take warn- 
ing from their case ; and whenever we catch ourselves 
looking with contempt at missionary work among the 
lowly, let us see therein the leaven of Pharisaism in 
our hearts, and take means to purge it out. 

I cannot conclude, however, without staying a few 
moments longer to give emphasis to two thoughts, 
which may gather up for us the lessons of this parable. 
The first is, that the recovery of any sinner, though he 
has been lost to God, is possible. No one is beyond 

1 1 Tiin. i. 11. The word is waKopiou. 



THE LOST COIN. 333 

hope here. No abandoned one, however sunk in de- 
pravity, needs despair of salvation; and no worker 
in the service of Christ needs regard the conversion 
of any one as hopeless. Paul said, "After me, any 
one ; " and you remember the story which William Jay 
tells of John Newton to this effect : " When I one day 
called upon him, he said, i I am glad to see you, for I 
have just received a letter from Bath, and you may 
know something of the writer,' mentioning his name. 
I told him I did, and that he had been for years a 
hearer of mine, but he was a most awful character, and 
almost in all evil. ' But,' says he, 4 he writes now like 
a penitent.' I said, ' He may be such, but if he be I 
shall never despair of the conversion of any one again.' 
' Oh,' said he, ' I never did since God saved me.' " 1 In 
that hopefulness for the conversion even of the very 
worst, lay, I am persuaded, much of the secret of New- 
ton's power ; and herein also, I believe, will be found 
much of the explanation of the success of those who, 
from being themselves among the chief of sinners, have 
become the most earnest of evangelists. Let us, there- 
fore, in our work despair of no one, and let no sinner 
regard himself as beyond recovery. Christ is able to 
save "unto the uttermost." The piece of money went 
a-missing in the house, and so it could be found. I 
have rarely seen this truth presented with such power 
as in the well-known lines entitled " Beautiful Snow." 
I do not know who wrote them ; I cannot tell, either, 
what truth there is in the story that was told on their 
first publication, of their being found in manuscript 
among the personal effects of a poor outcast woman 
who died in a hospital in Cincinnati : but they are all 
exquisite, and I reproduce here these three stanzas, that 

1 Autobiography and Reminiscences of Rev. William Jay, p. 275. 



834 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

they may rivet in your memories the truth on which I 

am now insisting : — 

" Once I was pure as the snow, but I fell, 
Fell like the snow — but from heaven to hell ; 
Fell to be trampled as filth of the street, 
Fell to be scoffed, to be spit on and beat ; 

Pleading — cursing — dreading to die, 
Selling my soul to whoever would buy ; 
Dealing in shame for a morsel of bread ; 
Hating the living, and fearing the dead. 
Merciful God ! have I fallen so low ? 
And yet I was once like the beautiful snow. 

Once I was fair as the beautiful snow, 
With an eye like a crystal, a heart like its glow ; 
Once I was loved for my innocent grace, — 
Flattered and sought for the charms of my face ! 

Father — mother — sisters, — all, 
God and myself, I have lost by my fall ; 
The veriest wretch that goes shivering by 
"Will make a wide sweep lest I wander too nigh ; 
For all that is on or about me, I know, 
There is nothing that's pure as the beautiful snow. 

Helpless and foul as the trampled snow, 
Sinner, despair not ! Christ stoopeth low 
To rescue the soul that is lost in sin, 
And raise it to life and enjoyment again. 

Groaning — bleeding — dying for thee, 
The Crucified hung on the cursed tree ! 
His accents of pity fall soft on thine ear. 
' Is there mercy for meV "Will he heed my weak prayer? 
O God ! in the stream that for sinners did flow, 
"Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow ! ' " 



Take to thyself, O sinner, the message of these lines, 
and make for thyself the prayer with which they con- 
clude. No matter how aggravated thine iniquities have 



THE LOST COIN. 335 

been, or how deeply depraved thy spirit may be, there 
is mercy now for thee. Thou mayst be accepted and 
renewed if only thou wilt betake thyself in penitence 
to God in Christ ; for still the proclamation is in force, 
" Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous 
man his thoughts; and let him return unto the Lord, 
and he will have mercy upon him, and to our God, for 
he will abundantly pardon. For my thoughts are not 
your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith 
the Lord. For as the heavens are high above the earth, 
so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts 
than your thoughts." * 

Finally, let us learn that the most Godlike work in 
which man can engage on earth is that of seeking to 
save the lost. These two parables might fitly be in- 
scribed with these words as their title, " The Seeking 
God." They tell us of the Divine yearning after and 
search for the lost soul of man, and the Divine joy over 
its recovery. But they put special emphasis on the 
search. The great work and happiness of Godhead are 
connected with the salvation of lost souls. Do you 
want to be like God ? Do you want to be a sharer in 
the loftiest joy which even Deity can know ? Then go 
forth to seek and to save that which is lost. Care 
not what sacrifices it may involve, or what discomforts 
it may entail upon you. Never mind though it may 
require you to go to dens of infamy or haunts of sin. 
These are not so far beneath you as this evil world was 
beneath the eternal Son of God when he came to earth 
for us men and for our salvation. Go, and he will take 
care of you, and give you success. John Gough, in one 
of his stirring orations, tells us how a fashionable lady 
who had dropped a diamond ring upon the street did 

i Isa. lv. 7-9. 



336 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

not hesitate to thrust her ungloved hand into the gut- 
ter, that she might seek for and recover her precious 
ornament ; and shall not we, believing in the protecting 
grace of God, expose ourselves, if need be, to contact 
with moral and spiritual impurity, if only we may be 
instrumental in recovering the immortal jewel of a 
human soul, and restoring it to Him to whom of right 
it belongs ? The great English novelist has no more 
pathetic chapter in his writings than that which tells 
how the big, burly, honest sailor set out from his boat- 
house on the Yarmouth shore to seek his lost Emily ; 
and when we shall feel about sinners as he did about 
her, when we shall go forth in a search after them as 
earnest, as persevering, and as loving as his was, then 
we shall " begin to be disciples " of Him who, " though 
he was rich, for our sakes became poor, that we through 
his poverty might be rich ; " and in our success we shall 
know something of the joy that is in heaven " over one 
sinner that repenteth." 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 337 



XXII. 

THE PRODIGAL SON. 

(Luke xv. 11-24.) 

One of the greatest preachers of the gospel that ever 
lived has left behind him a book, almost as widely 
known as " The Pilgrim's Progress " which came from 
the same hand, which he has called "Come and Wel- 
come." We have often had occasion to dwell upon the 
u come" and to repeat from this pulpit the gracious invi- 
tations which God in Christ has addressed to sinners of 
mankind ; but to-night our attention will be directed 
ultimately to the " welcome " which he gives to sinners 
on their return to him, as that is illustrated to us in 
this, which has, by common consent, come to be regarded 
as "the pearl of the parables." 

Like those by which it is immediately preceded, it 
was designed originally to rebuke the cold-hearted and 
self-righteous exclusiveness of the scribes and Phari- 
sees; and to show them, that, in despising Jesus for 
receiving sinners and eating with them, they were alto- 
gether out of harmony with Him in whose presence 
there is joy over one sinner that repenteth. But it 
differs from them in that, while they illustrate the 
earnestness with which God seeks the lost sinner, it 
describes the result of that search in the voluntary 
return of the sinner himself. They view the matter 
from the Divine side, and let us see the efforts which 



338 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

God has put forth through the incarnation of his Son, 
and the agency of his Spirit, to recover that which has 
been lost. This looks at the history, if I may so call 
it, from the human side, and shows us the sinner rising 
and returning to his Father. Yet, as we said in our 
last discourse, these are not so much two separate things 
as two ways of looking at one and the same thing. 
Admirably has Mr. Arnot said here, " It is not that 
some of fallen human kind are saved after the manner 
of the strayed sheep, and others after the manner of 
the prodigal son ; not that the Saviour bears one wan- 
derer home by his power, and that another, of his own 
accord, arises and returns to his Father. Both, these 
processes are accomplished in every conversion. The 
man comes, yet Christ brings him ; Christ brings him, 
yet he comes." 1 

Again, in the two preceding parables, little or nothing 
is said as to the sinner's departure from God, and his 
misery and degradation in his estrangement from God. 
The loss which they describe is rather that which is 
sustained by God ; and scarcely any hint is 'given, in 
either of them, of that which is incurred by the sinner 
himself. Here, however, the deplorable condition of 
man away from God, and in the far land of sin, is set 
in the forefront ; and nowhere in the whole range of 
literature, whether sacred or secular, have we a more 
vivid exemplification of the awful truth that " the way 
of transgressors is hard " than that which is presented 
to us in this matchless story. 

In the episode of the elder brother, too, we have 
something unique, and peculiar to this parable. In the 
former allegories, there is no jarring or dissonant note 
in the chorus of rejoicing over the finding of that which 

1 Arnot on the Parables, p. 428. 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 339 

had been iost ; but here, that, in the mirror which Jesus 
held up, the scribes and Pharisees might see their own 
likeness as well as his, we have one surly and sour dis- 
sentient, who virtually says to his father what they had 
said to Jesus, "This man receiveth sinners, and eateth 
with them." 

Without lingering longer, however, on these gen- 
eral matters, let us look at the incidents of the story 
itself. 

I. There is, first, a departure from home. " A certain 
man had two sons ; and the younger of them said unto 
his father, Father, give me the portion of goods that 
falleth to me ; and he divided unto them his living. 
And not many days after, the younger son gathered 
all together, and took his journey into a far country." 
What a heartless youth this is ! He cannot wait until, 
in the course of events, his father dies ; but he must 
have his portion now. His case, therefore, is not like 
that of him who, encouraged and commanded by his 
father, goes to some new land, there to carry on busi- 
ness for his parent and in conjunction with him, and 
who, regretting the necessity for his departure, carries 
with him the heart of a son, which beats continually in 
love and loyalty to his home. There would have been 
nothing wrong in that. Indeed, just in that way some 
of the noblest things ever wrought by men have been 
performed. But in this youth's heart there had been a 
very serious estrangement from his father, even before 
he left the homestead. He had become weary of the 
wholesome restraints of the parental household. He 
wanted to be his own master. He desired to be inde- 
pendent of all authority and interference. A son in 
name, he had already ceased to be a son in heart ; and 



340 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

so he was eager to be gone from a place whose whole 
atmosphere had become to him most disagreeable. See- 
ing all this, his father gave him what he wanted, and 
let him go his way. And as it was home he hated, so, 
the farther from home he could get, he thought he 
would be the better off; and therefore he went into "a 
far country." 

Now, this history has often been literally repeated; 
and I cannot help saying, that, if there should be here 
one youth meditating the taking of such a course, I 
would have him pause a little, and reflect on the very 
commonplace truth, that, go where he will, he will 
never find another father or another mother. Value, 
then, your home. Nip those unfilial feelings in the 
bud ; and remember that Divine command, the first in 
the Decalogue with promise, " Honor thy father and thy 
mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which 
the Lord thy God giveth thee." 

But it was not for its literal truth and pathos, ex- 
quisite as these are, that this story was told. It has a 
spiritual significance underlying its external incidents, 
and every man may see himself in this prodigal. For 
what is sin, but a departure from God, a determination 
to be independent of God, a casting-off of our allegiance 
to God, a taking of ourselves into our own hands, and 
a resolution to be our own God ? That is the essence 
of all moral evil, and the germ of which all other 
iniquities are but the development. Very cunningly 
did Satan say to our first parents, "Ye shall be as 
gods ; " and still this self-deihcation lies at the root of 
our alienation of heart from him, and rebellion of life 
against him. And see how, by the dowry of free will, 
God gives to man the liberty of choosing whether he 
will abide with him or not. Ah ! it is an awful thing 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 341 

to have this power of choice ; and, if we please, we have 
the liberty of leaving God. We may determine, if we 
choose, to become " lords of ourselves," and to take our- 
selves out of God's family. But we shall soon discover 
that to be " a heritage of woe." And we need not en- 
tail that upon ourselves simply to assert our liberty; 
for, equally by our choice, we may decide to give 
to God the love of our hearts and the loyalty of our 
lives. 

But if we do determine to leave him, let us see the 
guilt which we incur thereby. For it is the leaving of 
a Father. Some, indeed, will have it that there was no 
revelation of God's Fatherhood until Christ came into 
the world. But surely, in the relationship between the 
prodigal and his father here, we have a type of that 
which existed between God and man, before the fall. 
If that be not so, then, for any spiritual significance in 
the phrase, we might as well read, " a certain king had 
two subjects ; " or, " a certain master had two servants." 
But who does not see, that, if we so read, we should 
take away the whole power and pathos of the story? 
Hence we cannot but think that we have here a refer- 
ence to God's original fatherly relationship to the human 
race ; and while that explains why he was so anxious to 
get his lost children back, it also deepens the guilt of 
their departure from him. For, thus regarded, the sin- 
ner's offence is not merely that of disobedience to a mas- 
ter, or treason against a sovereign ; but it is also, in 
combination with both of these, ingratitude to a Father. 
We condemn as the most culpable of all things, the 
casting-off of a father by a son ; and we have no lan- 
guage strong enough to express our detestation of the 
conduct of Absalom to David. Yet, in God's sight, we 
have been doing, as sinners, the same thing ; and we 



342 TIIE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

have given him occasion to say of us, as he did of Israel 
of old, " I have nourished and brought up children, 
and they have rebelled against me." 

II. But now look at the ultimate destination of this 
youth. " He took his journey into a far country, and 
there wasted his substance with riotous living. And 
when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine in 
that land, and he began to be in want. And he went 
and joined himself to a citizen of that country ; and he 
sent him into his fields to feed swine. And he would 
fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine 
did eat, and no man gave unto him." He is now away 
from all restraint. He can do as he will, and see what 
he wills to do. Thus it was, in all probability, with him. 
He became connected with evil companions. They led 
him gradually into wicked courses. As long as his money 
lasted, and they could make any thing out of him, they 
were assiduous in their attentions, and superlative in 
their flatteries. When, however, his means were gone, 
they left him to himself. Then famine arose ; and to 
keep himself from starvation, he went and joined him- 
self to — or, as the word might perhaps be better ren- 
dered, glued himself to, foisted himself upon ; or, in 
the old Scottish vernacular, became a sorner on — a citi- 
zen who sent him out (oh, horror of horrors to a Jew !) 
to feed his swine ; and so dreadful was his hunger, that 
he would gladly have fed on the pods of the carob-tree 
with which they were foddered and fattened. So he who 
had fretted and chafed over being a son at home, subject 
to the household rules, actually becomes a servant; nay, 
worse than that, — a degraded loafer hanging about the 
house of one who, to get rid of his persistent appeals, 
sends him out to be a swineherd. He wanted liberty ; 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 343 

and he has got the lowest drudgery, with unsatisfied 
hunger as its constant accompaniment. 

Here, too, we may say that this history has been often 
literally fulfilled. There is scarcely a week that some 
poor, disillusioned man, who left his Scottish home to 
seek relief from parental restraint in this far country, 
does not come begging at my door for bread ; for even 
in this life Satan often gives a scorpion in the end, for 
the egg that he held up before his victim in the begin- 
ning. 

But we must not allow ourselves to forget, in the lit- 
eral truthfulness of the story, its allegorical significance. 
And when we regard that, we have clearly set before 
us the three stages of what we may call the sinner's 
progress. 

The first is riotous joy. We must not keep that alto- 
gether out of view. There is a pleasure in sin, of a 
sort ; for if that were not so, men would not be found 
committing it at all. There must be some kind of ex- 
hilaration in the flowing bowl, or in the wild thrill of 
sensual gratification. " Stolen waters are sweet," per- 
haps just because they are stolen ; but the sweetness 
does not last long, for it turns to bitterness in the 
belly. For a time, however, that is not perceived. So 
bright is the glare of the tinsel, that the baseness of the 
metal which it covers is not seen all at once. So loud 
is the noise of the revelry, that for a season " the still 
small voice " of conscience is not heard. So sparkling 
is the wine in the cup, that the coil of the adder at the 
bottom is not visible. But by and b} r , when the effer- 
vescence has ceased, the dread reality will appear ; and 
when it comes, the sting of the serpent will be terrible. 

And this brings us to the second stage in the sinner's 
progress. He has " wasted his substance " by his course. 



344 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

All ! how true that is ! Sin is the most expensive thing 
possible. It wastes money. It wears the body to 
decay. But, bad as these things are, there are even 
worse behind; for it blights the intellect and withers 
the moral nature of the man. It weakens the will ; it 
blunts the conscience ; it hardens the heart. It dries 
up all the finer feelings of the soul, so that the wife 
turns against the husband, and the husband against the 
wife ; the son against the father, and the father against 
the son ; while ultimately all regard for truth and holi- 
ness and purity is gone. Never shall I forget how a 
wife, speaking once of the weakness of her husband's 
will before the fascination of strong drink and evil 
companions, said, " He used to be a firm and manly 
fellow, but he's a bairn noo." Yes, a child in weakness, 
but alas ! not in innocence ; for sin had shorn the locks 
of his strength, and the Philistines in the shape of his 
own appetites had made a sport of him. Ah me ! where 
has the Father's portion gone in such a case ? Where 
are the good gifts of God to the soul now ? and who, in 
sinners like these, can discern even the faintest trace 
of the image of God which once they bore ? 

But worse yet. When this degradation has been 
reached, there is still a lower deep into which the sinner 
must descend ; for sin is an enslaving thing, and that is 
the last stage of his progress here. It becomes the 
master of the man who indulges in it, and sets him to 
the doing of the hardest drudgery. It hires him out, 
as it were, to feed swine, leaving him to feed along 
with them. That which was at first a joy becomes in 
the end a bondage. That which was at first a pleasant 
companion becomes at length a cruel taskmaster, who 
compels him to make bricks without straw, and some- 
times even without clay. I have read in the memoirs 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 345 

of a detective, how once, having discovered his man, 
he joined himself to him as a boon companion, went 
with him to his haunts, secured his confidence by long, 
fellowship, until at length, when all suspicion had been 
allayed, he got him, as a mere jest, to try on a pair of 
handcuffs, and then, snapping the spring that locked 
them, he took him, all helpless as he was, an easy prey. 
So sin does with its victim. It first ministers to his 
enjoyment, then drowns his vigilance, and then leads 
him away in helpless bondage to utter ruin. O ye 
who are setting out on this awful course, allured by 
glowing promises, let me beseech you to pause and 
ponder what shall be " at the last" " at the last" " at the 
last ! " Oh, think of that, and leave it off before it be 
meddled with ! 

III. But let us contemplate now the prodigal's reso- 
lution and return. " And when he came to himself, he 
said, How many hired servants of my father's have 
bread enough and to spare, and I perish with hunger ! 
I will arise and go to my father, and I will say unto 
him, Father, I have sinned against heaven and before 
thee, and am no more worthy to be called thy son : 
make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, 
and went to his father." As he sat in his starvation 
and degradation, the memory of that home which he had 
left in his pride and self-will came back upon him and 
roused him to reflection. The very abjectness of his 
misery led him ultimately to resolve to return to his 
father's house. Till now he had kept on hoping that 
" something would turn up ; " but when the swine were 
preferred to him, and no man gave unto him, it was all 
over with him. He had then to decide between death 
by starvation, and returning to his father ; and though 



346 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

for a time shame and pride would keep him from taking 
the decisive step, at length hunger overcame him, and 
he said, " 1 will arise and go back." And it is no sooner 
said than done, for " he arose, and went to his father." 
lie did not say, "I will wait until I am a little more 
respectable." He did not allow himself to think that 
he would be laughed at by those who had known him 
there, or that he would, perhaps, be taunted by his 
father with his folly. All these things were banished 
from his mind by the stress of the emergency in which 
he found himself ; and he remembered only, that, while 
he was perishing with hunger, there was bread enough 
and to spare at home. So he started up, and, leaving 
his guzzling herd to take care of themselves, he set out 
on his homeward way. 

This, also, has often been literally repeated in the 
histories of individual men. But we may not dwell on 
that; for, still seeking a spiritual significance in the 
allegory, we find here the story of the conversion of 
a soul. And when we view it thus, observe the deep 
significance of the words, " when he came to himself." 
Some would take that expression to mean, that he was 
beside himself, or insane, and that now he came to a 
sound mind. But if he were insane, he was afflicted 
with that " moral insanity " of which we heard so much 
during the trial of Guiteau, and of which Dr. Fordyce 
Barker of this city said so epigrammatically and so 
truly, " Moral insanity is wickedness." I rather think, 
therefore, that we must interpret these words to mean 
that all this while he had been beneath himself, and 
that now for the first time he arose to the life that was 
worthy of his father's son. When he came to what he ■ 
should have been before he left his home, when he saw 
things in their true light, and ascended to his proper 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 347 

self, he said, "I will go to my father." Now, in the 
same way, every sinner is living beneath his proper self. 
His higher nature is, as it were, dormant in him. He 
has a spiritual faculty which allies him with God, and 
which, as the holiest part of his nature, is most really 
and truly himself. But he is not conscious that he has 
it. It is virtually dead within him. He has overlaid 
it with trespasses and sins. He is not himself. I do 
not mean, of course, that his personal identity is gone, 
but, rather, that the noblest part of his nature is unoccu- 
pied by him. He lives, so to say, on the ground-floor of 
his soul-house. He has never gone up into the higher ; 
and that part of his nature which was intended to be 
its crowning glory, and which allies him to heaven, 
is shut up and.tenantless, like a dusty attic. But at 
his conversion he comes to his true self. New thoughts 
stir within his soul, new feelings vibrate in his bosom. 
He begins to see what before had been to him as a land- 
scape is to one that is blind. It is not that new things 
are called into existence outside of him, for all things 
are there as they were before. The only difference is, 
that his eyes have been opened to see them ; and the 
wonder of his whole subsequent life is, that he never 
saw them until then. He perceives now the guilt, the 
degradation, the danger, of sin ; and determines to re- 
turn unto the Lord with the expression of penitence and 
the prayer for acceptance. 

The parable does not tell us any thing of the manner 
in which, or the agent by whom, this great change is 
wrought out in him. But elsewhere we learn that it 
is wrought by the power of the Holy Spirit, through the 
belief of the truth as it is in Jesus ; and we must bear 
that in mind throughout our consideration of the sub- 
ject. We are looking at the human side, and all that 



THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

is done on the Divine side must here be taken for 
granted. Now, the first evidence a sinner gives that 
his eyes are opened is in his perception of his misery. 
% * I perish with hunger." Never before had this youth 
allowed himself to think that death by starvation was 
to be the result if he remained in the far land ; but so 
soon as that became apparent, he took his resolution 
to arise. Now, it is the same with the sinner and his 
return to God. I believe that if we could narrow his 
choice to one or other of these alternatives, everlasting 
perdition as the consequence of sin, or eternal salvation 
through faith in Christ and repentance toward God, he 
would not hesitate as to his decision. But because he 
persists in believing that he shall in some way escape, 
even if he should persist in his course, he continues in- 
different to the statements of the gospel. He imagines 
that somehow or other, he hardly knows how, in spite 
of all he is and all he has done, he will elude his doom; 
and so he goes thoughtlessly on. He believes the Devil's 
first lie, " Ye shall not surely die ; " and in the faith of 
that he remains in the " far land." But when, by the 
working in hini of the Holy Spirit, through the truth, 
he comes to himself, all these deceptions are swept 
away. He sees only the terrible fact, " I perish : " and 
then comes the revelation of God's love to him in 
Christ, the belief of which moves him to repentance. 
You can do no good with him until he sees, that left to 
himself, and away from God, he is eternally undone : 
but, once awakened to that fact, he is eager to cry, 
;,i What must I do to be saved ? " When he can say, 
" I perish," he exclaims also, " Lord, save me!" And he 
does not make long delay : but, realizing Ins situation 
to the full, he exclaims, " I will return unto my Father, 
and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned before 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 349 

heaven and in thy sight, and am no more worthy to be 
called thy son. Make me as one of thy hired servants." 

Now, taking this as representing "the penitent's 
progress," one or two things need to be noted as sug- 
gested by it. 

In the first place, there is unreserved confession of 
sin. He does not soften matters, and speak of his 
"faults" and "failings." He does not say, "I have 
been a little wild." But he puts the plain truth forth 
in all its hideousness: " I have sinned" Neither, again, 
does he cast the blame on others. He does not say, 
" So-and-so led me astray ; " " If it had not been for the 
companions by whom I was surrounded, I had never 
come to this ; " or, " If I had only been in other circum- 
stances, I would have kept myself from iniquity." But 
he takes all the blame to himself. His language is, "_Z" 
have sinned : the guilt is mine. I have no wish to 
deny it, or to explain it away. I am ashamed of myself, 
and ' am no more worthy to be called thy son.' " 

But, again, the enormity of his wickedness " before 
heaven" is that which most distresses him. He had 
brought many evils on himself ; he had inflicted great 
injuries upon others : but that which most burdens him 
now is, that he has sinned against God his Father, who 
has done so much for him, and has even, after and above 
all, sent his Son into the world for his salvation. This 
is painful to him in the extreme, and he can do nothing 
but weep over it ; but his tears, in the estimation of 
God, are of more value than glittering diamonds, for 
they tell him that his wandering son is now returning. 
This is true penitence. This is the broken spirit which 
is to God a pleasing sacrifice. This is the contrite heart 
which the Lord will not despise. 

But, looking yet more minutely at these words, we 



860 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

find iii them a determination to personal exertion. "7 
will arise and go." The prodigal did not wait until 
some one else should come and cany him to his home. 
He was full}' persuaded, that, if he ever reached his 
father's house, it could only be by travelling the dis- 
tance for himself : so " he arose and went." Now, it is 
similar with the sinner. Though the distance between 
him and God is not physical, but moral, yet, if he would 
be saved, there must be a putting-forth of his own per- 
sonal agency. He does not require to rise from the 
place where he is, and go away to some distant country, 
in order to return to God. He may pass through the 
whole transition while yet he is in one and the same 
earthly spot. The "going" is spiritual. It is the restor- 
ing of his heart to God; the giving-back of his love 
and loyalty and service to Ms heavenly Father; the 
surrender to God of the sovereignty or lordship of him- 
self, which he had determined at the first to keep. Now, 
that is his own act ; and in that we have the consumma- 
tion of conversion. No doubt, as I have said, the Holy 
Spirit is in it all. Yet the soul gives itself back to God ; 
and we must beware, lest we delay this self-renunciation 
on the plea of "waiting for the Spirit." That would 
be just as foolish in us as it would have been in the 
prodigal here to have delayed until some one came and 
carried hiin home. Hence, if we wish the Holy Spirit 
to work in us and with us, we must ourselves make this 
self-surrender ; and, when we have done that, we shall 
discover that he has been beforehand with us, and has 
already anticipated us with his quickening grace. 

Finally, here, this resolution was promptly acted upon. 
" He arose, and went to his father." Just as he was, 
he set out on his homeward way. He did not say. M I 
must wash myself, and change my raiment, and then 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 351 

start out." If he had mused in that fashion, he had 
never returned ; but he went as he was. So, in conver- 
sion, the sinner gives himself back to God just as he is. 
He does not seek to make himself better. He does not 
delay to work out for himself a robe of righteousness. 
He does not wait even for deeper feelings or more intense 
convictions. He puts himself at once into God's hands, 
sure that, for Christ's sake, he will make him all that 
he should be. This is the whole matter, — this only ; 
but all this : and, if there be one hearing me to-night 
who is moved by the presentation of these truths to go 
back to his Father, let me beseech him to go back at 
once, and to give himself without reservation and with- 
out delay to God in Christ. 

" Just as thou art, without one trace 
Of love, or joy, or inward grace, 
Or meetness for the heavenly place, 
O guilty sinner, come ! " 

IV. But, that we may give completeness to our treat- 
ment of this part of the parable, let us look, lastly, at the 
prodigal's reception by his father. " And when he was 
yet a great way off, his father saw him, and ran, and fell 
on his neck, and kissed him. And the son said unto him, 
Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight, 
and am no more worthy to be called thy son. But the 
father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, 
and put it on him ; and put a ring on his hand, and 
shoes on his feet ; and bring hither the fatted calf, and 
kill it ; and let us eat, and be merry. For this my son 
was dead, and is alive again ; he was lost, and is found. 
And they began to be merry." As he draws near to 
the old home, we can imagine better than describe his 
feelings. Every thing looks just as it did when he left. 






THE PARABLES 7 VIOUE. 

But, oh! the difference in himself! And the remem- 
brance of the life he had been living might for a 
moment fiQ his heart with misgiving and make him 
slacken his pace a little, as he asked himself how he 
would be received. But before he has had time to 
answer his inner questionings, he sees a familiar form 
ing down the hill to meet him; and before he 
knows, he feels himself infolded in his father's arms. 
What a meeting it was There are no words of upbraid- 
ing from the venerable man. He can do nothing but 
weep out his joy on the neck of his son : and the son 
can only sob his words of penitence, "I have sinned 
against heaven, and before thee, and am no more worthy 
to be called thy son." But he does not ask now to be 
made as "one of the hired servants;" for already, in that 

the leaving-out of these words by him is the first filial 

-_. .:'_: — - --- :' . :*ir iizi5T~_f. X :r Srl:L:zi Lis "lis ilfiz-riT.- 
rlii. '.:::. lir-ri-illv " -::--.-'.. ir. :Lr L:l_t :: :. ir. ..I - - rf: --■1 
penitent runaway. But here it is employed mainly to 
::t :Lc — rl: '.—-. ""._ :."_ "- : i zi~ r- :■: .~_r z e: ii.tZlt. 
What a long way he comes to meet the sinnei ! even all 
the way to the cross of Calvary, for that is the place 
where every penitent finds him self infolded in God ? s 
fatherly arms. And there is no casting-up to him there 
of his evil courses ; for Jehovah says, M I am he that will 
not remember thy sins." M He kisses the past into for- 
getfulness." Bygones are bygones forevermore between 
them ; and the sinner is received as gladly as if he were 
an angel returning from the doing of some high behest, 
— nay. with a deeper and diviner joy even than that. 

But let us go on ; for there is a feast behind, and a 
whole heap of blessings more. The fairest robe is put 
upon the recovered son ; a ring is placed on his hand, 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 353 

and shoes on his feet ; a joyful festival is held ; mirth 
and song resound through the happy dwelling ; and, at 
every pause in the music, the old man's voice is heard 
repeating the glad refrain, " This my son was dead, and 
is alive again ; he was lost, and is found." 

Many commentators find a spiritual meaning in eacli 
of the details which are here mentioned. The robe, 
they tell us, is the righteousness of Christ ; the ring, 
the token of assurance ; the shoes, the badge of sonship, 
since no slave was permitted to have sandalled feet; 
the feast, the Lord's Supper. But all these seem now 
to me to be over-refinements. The whole description, 
true as it is, even in its minutest features, to Eastern 
life, is designed to set before us the joy with which God 
in Christ receives returning sinners ; and it only weak- 
ens our impression of that, to dwell thus on the acces- 
sories of the story as if they had particular spiritual 
significance. The meaning of this part of the parable 
simply is, that God will receive the penitent with glad- 
ness, and, so far from taunting him with his guilt, will 
honor him by giving him the richest blessings which 
he has to bestow. He will re-instate him into the posi- 
tion which he had forfeited by his sin ; he will give him 
righteousness without and within, peace of conscience, 
joy in the Holy Ghost, and happy fellowship with Him- 
self ; and over his return there shall be joy in heaven 
among the angels that surround the throne. As Trench 
has said, the banquet symbolizes " the festal joy and re- 
joicing which is in heaven at the sinner's return, and 
no less in the church on earth and in his own heart 
also ; " 1 while Arnot puts it more simply thus, " The 
feast indicates the joy of a forgiving God over a for- 
given man, and the joy of a forgiven man in a forgiving 

1 Notes on the Parables, pp. 412, 413. 



THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

God." x Thus we have here again a point of contact 
between this parable and the two that go before it. 
The great purpose of them all is to illustrate the 
fact that there is joy in heaven over one sinner that 
repenteth. But the peculiarity here is, that the delight 
is shared by the recovered one himself ; and as we have 
already considered the gladness in heaven over a sin- 
ner's repentance, we may conclude our discourse now 
by referring briefly to the joy of the penitent himself. 

The new life begins in feast. The convert has "joy " 
as well as "peace in believing." While God rejoices 
over him, he rejoices in God ; and in the first experience 
of his reception by God this gladness is peculiarly in- 
tense. When Philip preached in Samaria, and multi- 
tudes were turned unto the Lord, we read that " there 
was great joy in that city ; " 2 and when the Ethiopian 
treasurer had found the salvation that is in Christ 
Jesus we are told " that he went on his way rejoicing." 3 
So it always is. Many illustrative cases might be 
gleaned from Christian biography in proof of this asser- 
tion, but we cannot enter now upon so wide a field. 
Suffice it to say that the holiest, most elevating, and 
most lasting gladness which the soul can know is that 
which springs from the contemplation of God's mercy, 
revealed to it and received by it through faith in the 
Lord Jesus Christ. Peter used not the words of wild 
fanaticism, but the language of sober truth, when he 
said, " In whom, though now we see him not, yet be- 
lieving we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of 
glory ; " 4 and some among us can indorse the words of 
Mrs. Isabella Graham when, referring to her conver- 
sion, she says, "My views then were dark compared 

1 Arnot on the Parables, p. 440. 

2 Acts viii. 8. « ibid. viii. 39. * i p et . i. 8. 



THE PRODIGAL SON. 355 

with what they are now ; but this I remember, that, at 
the time, I felt a heart-satisfying trust in the mercy of 
God through Christ, and for a time rejoiced with joy 
scarcely supportable, singing almost continually the 
hundred and third Psalm."' 2 

Such, my friends, is the banquet which God spreads 
for the returning sinner ; but we may not forget that 
he makes both the church on earth and the church in 
heaven sharers with him in his joy. For when the 
penitent breaks his alabaster box over the feet of Jesus, 
the whole house of God is filled and fragrant with the 
odor of the ointment. All in it make merry (I like the 
homely word) over a sinner's conversion ; and though, 
on the principle that it is more blessed to give than to 
receive, the highest delight is that of God, yet we must 
not forget the gladness of the penitent himself. Sin- 
ner, do you want to be happy ? Then return to God. 
Away from him you must still be in want, hungering 
after the world's husks, which cannot always be ob- 
tained, and which, when obtained, give neither sus- 
tenance nor satisfaction ; but from him you will receive 
abiding felicity, the joy of forgiveness, of acceptance, of 
assurance, of holiness, and finally, as the climax and 
consummation of them all, the joy of heaven. This is 
put in your offer now, and the only condition annexed 
to your reception of it is that you will " arise, and go to 
your Father." 

1 Life of Mrs. Isabella Graham, p. 150. 



356 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XXIII. 

THE ELDER BROTHER. 

(Luke xv. 25-32.) 

In the general household joy over the prodigal's re- 
turn, there was one who refused to share. The elder 
son, who now, for the first time, comes into prominence, 
was absent in the field at the moment of his brother's 
re-appearance, and became aware that something unusual 
had occurred only when, as he drew near, he heard the 
sound of music and dancing. Instead, however, of go- 
ing trustfully forward into the house, in perfect assur- 
ance that every thing over which his father presided 
must be right, he showed a most unfilial disposition by 
calling one of the servants, and asking him what " these 
things meant." Promptly and plainly, without any 
desire, as some allege, to sneer at the whole proceed- 
ing, and wishing simply to state the facts as they were, 
the domestic made reply : " Thy brother is come ; and 
thy father hath killed for him the fatted calf, because 
he hath received him safe and sound." But the infor- 
mation thus given was exceedingly distasteful to the 
elder brother ; and he was irritated and annoyed be- 
cause, while so much had been done to celebrate his 
brother's return, nothing had ever been received by 
himself as a token of appreciation of his services. The 
sonship thus had degenerated in his heart, even while 
he was living at home, into the spirit of the hireling. 



THE ELDER BROTHER. 357 

He had, indeed, never done any positive wrong. He 
had been thoroughly moral, perfectly respectable, and 
exceedingly industrious ; but he had been all these, 
not from the loving impulse of a son, but, as it now 
appears, from the desire of reward; and because, treat- 
ing him as a son, his father had never thought of giving 
him any thing in the shape of that, he was exceedingly 
displeased. Having had within him all the while the 
disposition of a hireling, he could neither understand 
nor appreciate the parental joy over the recovery of a 
son ; and, like a hireling, he complained at not having 
received a hireling's pay, while so much was given to an 
erring but now penitent son. So " he was angry, and 
would not go in." 

Thus he remained outside of the father's house, and 
was in a state of most unfilial alienation from his par- 
ent. But when his father learned of his determination, 
he showed to him precisely the same affection which he 
had manifested to his brother, only in another fashion. 
He welcomed back the wanderer; but now he went out 
after the departing one, and entreated him "to come 
in." But he was met in a very haughty and self-suffi- 
cient spirit ; for the angry son replied, " Lo, these 
many years do I serve thee, neither transgressed I at 
any time thy commandment ; and yet thou never gavest 
me a kid, that I might make merry with my friends ; 
but as soon as this thy son was come, who hath devoured 
thy living with harlots, thou hast killed for him the 
fatted calf." 

Now, in all this we cannot fail to observe how the 
heart of the son has degenerated into that of the ser- 
vant. He dwells on the value of the work which he 
had performed, and complains that he has received 
nothing for it ; t but a leal-spirited son never can do too 



358 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

much for his father, and works " all for love and nothing 
for reward." There was here, therefore, much of the 
disposition that animated Peter when he said to his 
Lord, " Lo, we have left all, and followed thee : what 
shall we have therefore ? " and which was exposed and 
rebuked, as we saw, in the parable of the vinej T ard labor- 
ers. And closely allied with that, there was an amount 
of self-coniplacency which makes this man exceedingly 
unlovely. He had an overweening estimate of his own 
importance. He dwelt upon his model behavior (" nei- 
ther transgressed I at any time thy commandment") 
to such a degree that any attention shown to another 
was interpreted by him as a slight upon himself; while 
he who received such attentions was despised as alto- 
gether unworthy of consideration. 

But these two qualities are always attendant upon 
self-conceit. The Pharisees " trusted in themselves, 
that they were righteous, and despised others ; " and 
when the Lord showed favor to the publicans and sin- 
ners, they felt as if he had insulted themselves. He 
who is always thinking of his own excellences takes 
offence where none is meant. One's appreciation of 
another is by him interpreted as a depreciation of him- 
self; and to make much of any one in his hearing, is 
enough to provoke him to speak of that other in terms 
of cutting and sarcastic scorn. Hence, here, the mak- 
ing of a festival over the prodigal's return draws forth 
from the elder brother a complaint that he had been 
neglected, and a contemptuous allusion to the prodi- 
gal's course, which altogether ignores the penitence 
that prompted his return ; while, at the same time, there 
is a repudiation on his part of all relationship to such a 
worthless fellow. His father might do as he pleased, 
of course, but though he received the. prodigal as a 



THE ELDER BROTHER. 359 

son, that would not make him acknowledge him as a 
brother ; and so he is careful to say, " as soon as this 
thy son was come." How little sympathy there is thus 
between the elder son and his father ! In the house- 
hold all those years, he had not been of it ; and, for all 
his industry and respectability, he had no true sonship 
in his soul. Nay, if I rightly interpret the answer of 
the servant to him when he asked what the music and 
the dancing meant, there was more of sonship in the 
servant's heart than there was even in the son's. 

But see how tenderly his father treats him. He takes 
no notice of the sneering innuendoes which were meant 
to be so reproachful, but calmly replies, " Son, thou art 
ever with me, and all that I have is thine." As if he 
had said, "Why speak of making merry with thy friends, 
when thou hast always had a feast in me ; and as for 
thy brother's waste, say no more of that ; for thou art 
none the poorer for his prodigality, since all that I have 
is thine." But he will go no farther in the way of en- 
treaty than that. He will not acknowledge that he has 
in any degree overlooked the one son, in his joy over 
the return of the other, nor will he admit that he has 
done any thing improper in holding such a festival on 
such an occasion. On the contrary, he defends his pro- 
cedure, and repeats his gladness, at one and the same 
time, saying, "It was meet" — that is, "it was fitting, 
it was in every respect in harmony with the dictates 
of nature and religion ; " or, perhaps, more literally, 1 
"it was necessary, I could not but, I could not keep 
myself from yielding to the impulse " — " to make 
merry, and be glad ; for this thy brother " — mark the 
gentle reproof in the words — " was dead, and is alive 
again ; he was lost, and is found." 

1 The Greek is I8«. 



360 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

But, passing now to the interpretation of the parable, 
the question arises, whom this elder brother is intended 
to represent. Different answers have been given by 
different expositors. Some have said that he symbolizes 
the angels in their relation to the human race ; but that 
cannot be entertained by us for a moment ; for, as the 
other parables in this chapter make very apparent, the 
angels, so far from being envious and dissatisfied at 
God's reception of returning sinners of mankind, sin- 
cerely rejoice with him over the recovery of those whom 
he had lost. Others have alleged that the elder brother 
stands for the Jews, while the younger is the represent- 
ative of the Gentiles; and it must be confessed that 
something may be said for that interpretation. For, as 
a nation, the Jews were most exclusive, and regarded 
with repugnance the very idea of the Gentiles being 
made partakers with them of the blessings of the cove- 
nant. Thus when our Lord, in the synagogue of Xaza- 
reth, referred to Elijah's mission to the woman of 
Zarephath, and Elisha's cure of Xaaman the Syrian, 
thereby suggesting that the Gentiles were to be the 
heirs of the blessings which the Jews refused to accept, 
his hearers were so enraged, that they took him to the 
brow of the hill on which their city was built, and 
would have cast him over if he had not escaped out 
of their hands. 1 So,, again, when Paul addressed the 
crowd from the castle-stairs at Jerusalem, they gave 
him patient audience until he spoke of his having been 
sent to the Gentiles, when they immediately cried out, 
" Away with such a fellow from the earth ! it is not fit 
that he should live." 2 Nay, so strong was this feeling, 
even in the breast of Peter the Apostle, that he had to 
be prepared by a special vision from heaven for preach- 

1 Luke iv. 21-29. 2 Acts xxii. 22. 



THE ELDER BROTHER. 361 

ing the gospel to the household of Cornelius. 1 There 
is no cloubt, therefore, that the disposition of the elder 
brother, as here portrayed, was manifested by the Jews 
in their treatment of the Gentiles. But whether that 
was the primary reference of this part of the parable, 
is another question. There is nothing in the circum- 
stances in which it was first spoken to make that in the 
least degree probable. The Lord had not been alluding 
in any way whatever to the call of the Gentiles ; and 
it would be most unnatural, and indeed unwarrantable, 
to put such a restriction upon his words. 

Others, therefore, understand that the purpose of our 
Lord in adding this episode of the elder brother was to 
introduce him as the representative of the scribes and 
Pharisees, by whose taunt, " This man receiveth sinners, 
and eateth with them," these three parables were called 
forth. But even that interpretation is beset with diffi- 
culties. For how could it be said, with truth, that God 
was " ever with " the scribes and Pharisees, and that all 
that he had was theirs ? We can understand, indeed, 
how they should say that they had faithfully served 
God, and had never at any time transgressed his com- 
mandment ; for that is only in keeping with their well- 
known self-complacency : but that such a claim should 
be admitted, and that they should be represented as 
having God ever with them, is certainly somewhat 
staggering. Calvin meets that difficulty thus; and I 
quote his words because they fairly express the view of 
all those who have adopted this interpretation : " He 
compares the scribes, who were swelled with presump- 
tion, to good and modest men, who had always lived 
with decency and sobriety, and had honorably supported 
their families, — nay, even to obedient children, who, 

1 Acts x. 



THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

throughout their whole lives, had patiently submitted 
to their father's control. And, though they were utterly 
unworthy of this commendation, yet Christ, speaking 
according to their belief, attributes to them, by way of 
concession, their pretended holiness, as if it had been 
virtue ; as if he had said, ' Though I were to grant to 
you what you falsely boast of, that you have always 
been obedient children to God, still you ought not so 
haughtily and cruelly to reject your brethren when they 
repent of their wicked life.' " 1 To those who accept 
this explanation as satisfactory, the elder brother has a 
primary, precise, and distinct reference to the scribes 
and Pharisees ; and in this view, the uncertainty in 
which the parable leaves us as to whether or not he 
actually went into the house to participate in the feast 
becomes very suggestive, as being in itself an appeal to 
those self-righteous persons to whom it was addressed, 
to reconsider their position, if peradventure they might 
— as, indeed, we know some of them afterwards did — 
go in, and hold high festival with those whom Christ 
had lifted out of the grossest degradation. 

But still the difficulty presses. The elder brother is 
regarded as a true, though temporarily erring, son; and 
therefore others, of whom Matthew Henry may be re- 
garded as the exponent, take him as the embodiment 
of such as "are really good, and have been so from 
their youth up, and never went astray into any vicious 
course of living ; to whom, therefore, the words, ' Son, 
thou art ever with me, and all that I have is thine,' 
are applicable without any difficulty, though they are 
not so to the scribes and Pharisees." 2 

Now, if I were shut up to the adoption of any one 
of these explanations to the exclusion of all the rest, I 

1 Calvin's Commentary, in loco. 2 Commentary, in loco. 



THE ELDER BROTHER. 

should without any hesitation, and in spite of its diffi- 
culties, accept that which regards the elder brother as 
representing the scribes and Pharisees, because it is 
most in harmony with the original purpose of the para- 
ble. Still I do not see that we are required to identify 
him with any particular individual or any special class. 
He is, in my view, to be regarded as the idealized in- 
carnation of an evil disposition. He is the impersona- 
tion and embodiment of envy ; and wherever, or in 
whomsoever, at any time, or in any degree, that quality 
manifests itself, there you have, for the time being, the 
elder brother. 

In speaking of the younger son, Mr. Arnot very justly 
says, " In representing the human figure, an artist may 
proceed upon either of two distinct principles, according 
to the object which, for the time, he may have in view. 
He may, on the one hand, delineate the likeness of an 
individual, producing a copy of his particular features, 
with all their beauties and all their blemishes alike ; or 
he may, on the other hand, conceive and execute an 
ideal picture of a man, the portrait of no person in par- 
ticular, with features selected from many specimens of 
the race, and combined in one complete figure. The 
parable (figure?) of the prodigal is a picture of the 
latter kind: it is not out and out the picture of any 
man, but it is to a certain extent the picture of every 
man." 1 Now, in like manner, the elder brother also is 
an ideal figure ; not agreeing in every minute particular 
with any one man, or any one class of men, but yet so 
representing the workings of envy, that the envious man 
anywhere may see himself in him, whether he be a Phari- 
see or a scribe standing outside of the spiritual church 
of Christ altogether, or a genuine but imperfect disciple 

1 Arnot on the Parables, p. 431 



364 THE PARABLES OE OUR SAVIOUR. 

who is really connected with the Lord Jesus Christ. 
The advantage of this interpretation is, that, while it 
gets rid of the difficulties which meet every one who 
attempts to identify the elder brother absolutely with 
any individual or with any class, it so widens the appli- 
cation of this episode to the parable, that it conveys a 
lesson to every sort of reader. Take the elder brother 
as representing the Pharisee simply and only, and very 
few will be inclined to think that there is any thing of 
him in themselves. Take him, on the other hand, as 
the idealized embodiment of the spirit of envy, and each 
of us must feel that there is a great deal of "elder- 
brotherliness " in his own heart. In the rigid legalist, 
indeed, there is nothing but this spirit of envy; but 
there is more or less of it even in the true follower of 
Christ, and so the elder brother stands out here as a 
warning to us all. 

"Who is this elder son?" The question was once 
asked in an assembly of ministers at Elberfeldt, and 
Daniel Krummacher made answer, "I know him very 
well : I met him only yesterday." — " Who is he ? " they 
asked eagerly ; and he replied solemnly, " Myself." He 
then explained that on the previous day, hearing that 
a very gracious visitation of God's goodness had been re- 
ceived by a very ill-conditioned man, he had felt not a 
little envy and irritation. 1 That was the true reading of 
the story, and it is capable of manifold application. It 
fits the case of the scribes and Pharisees, to whom it 
was first addressed, and who sneered at Christ for his 
reception of sinners. It fits the Jews in the Saviour's 
day, and even in the early Church, who looked askance 
at the Gentiles, and complained because unto them also 

1 Stier's Words of the Lord Jesus, vol. iv. p. 162; quoted by Dr. 
James Hamilton in The Pearl of Parables, p. 164. 



THE ELDER BROTHER. 365 

the gospel had been preached. It fits the disciples at 
Jerusalem, who, immediately after Paul's conversion, 
were "afraid of him, and believed not that he was a 
disciple." J 

The appropriateness of this explanation was very sin- 
gularly impressed on my own mind, in a manner which I 
can never forget. Some nineteen years ago I preached 
to my congregation in Liverpool, one Lord's Day morn- 
ing, from this episode to the parable of the Prodigal Son, 
and gave the same interpretation of it as I have now 
presented to you. As I was leaving the church for my 
home, I was requested to visit a dying man whom I 
had seen frequently before, but who was just then, 
apparently, about to pass within the veil. He had 
been for many years a careless and irreligious man ; but 
as I spoke with him from time to time, I marked that 
a great change had come over him. I had conversed 
faithfully and earnestly with him, of Jesus and his sal- 
vation ; and he had turned in sincere penitence to his 
Father, and was, as I sincerely believe, accepted by 
him. When I entered his room that morning, I found 
him in great happiness, rejoicing in the near prospect 
of being with his Lord, and apparently perfectly happy. 
I talked with him a little on the things of the kingdom, 
and after prayer I took my leave. His brother-in-law 
followed me down-stairs, and said, "I cannot under- 
stand this at all. Here have I been serving Christ for 
these twenty years, and I have never experienced such 
joy as he expresses ; and yet he has not been a Chris- 
tian, if he be really one, for more than a few weeks." 
Immediately I recognized the elder brother, and I staid 
long enough to show him just how he looked in the 
light of this parable. I told him that I had been preach- 

i Acts ix. 26. 



THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

ing about him that very morning. -About me?" he 
said. - Yes. about you ; " and I then went on to ex- 
plain to him the meaning of this episode, while I warned 
him of the danger of being angry, and refusing to go 
intu the Father's house to share the joy over the return- 
ing prodigal. The result was that he saw his error, and 
was delivered from his envy. Xow, that incident, oc- 
curring just at that precise time, has given a new point 
to the parable in my view ever since, and makes me 
far more anxious to get the elder-brotherliness out of 
my own heart than to identify the elder brother with 
any particular class. 

The pastor of age and excellence, who is mourning 
over the apparent fruitlessness of his labors, and is 
tempted to ask why God makes a young brother in the 
neighborhood, of little experience and less eminence, 
instrumental in bringing multitudes to Christ, while he 
has no such results from his ministrations : the sabbath- 
school teacher who throws up his work in wounded 
self-love, because another, who has no such qualifica- 
tions as he possesses, seems to be so much more suc- 
cessful than he ; the laborer in any department of 
beneficence, who, because he thinks that more is made 
of some one else than of himself, gives way to personal 
pique, and withdraws altogether from the enterprise; 
the over-sensitive, conceited man. who is alwavs takino* 
offence where none is meant, and is so continually 
anxious for the due recognition of his dignity, that he 
manages to exclude himself from every society with 
which he is connected, — may all look here, and in the 
elder brother each will see himself. 

But let not even these imagine that they are beyond 
God's acceptance. The father came out. and entreated 
the elder brother to go into the feast, and so God is still 



THE ELDER BROTHER. . 367 

appealing to the envious. The door is open to them, 
if they will but enter; and when they consent to do 
so in the spirit of sons and not of servants, in humility 
and not in self-conceit, in love and not as hirelings, 
then they too will rejoice, and the festival, instead of 
aggravating them into misery, will be felt by them to 
be an appropriate expression of their gladness. 

I conclude with three practical lessons from the whole 
subject. 

In the first place, let Christians endeavor to show to 
sinners the same spirit which God has shown to them- 
selves. The gentleness of God to us should be repeated 
by us in our intercourse with others, and we should 
deal with those who are going in penitence to Christ 
with the same tenderness as he himself will manifest to 
them. Parents, this parable speaks to you about the 
training of your children, and bids you seek their godly 
upbringing, not in rigorous and unbending sternness, 
but in tender love. Sabbath-school teachers, this par- 
able bids you, in your earnest efforts after the welfare 
of your scholars, show to them the same gentleness that 
the father showed his son when he fell upon his neck, 
and kissed him ; and it warns you against indulging in 
vituperation and reproach. Had the prodigal met the 
elder brother first, he might have gone away back to his 
iniquity, ay, even from the very gate into his father's 
house. So a cruel, unfeeling, taunting word may be 
the means of turning away from his penitent resolution 
one who might else have gone to Christ in genuine con- 
version. Pastor, there is a message here for thee also ; 
and thou art commanded to be, in the midst of thy flock, 
loving as this father was to his home-coming son, and 
to beware lest by unfeeling or mistaken sternness thou 
shouldst drive away those who are seeking to enter into 



368 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the fold. Oh for more of this divine tenderness among 
us all! Let us remember that the reputation of the 
gospel, and in some sort also the character of God him- 
self, are at stake in our conduct; and let us tremble 
with a holy fear lest we should give occasion to his ene- 
mies to blaspheme his name, or lest we should, by our 
repulsiveness, scare away some poor sinner from the 
loving Father who is so willing to receive him. Men 
judge of God through us. Let us see to it, therefore, 
that they have from our deportment toward them a 
right idea of his willinghood to welcome them. 

In the second place, let anxious sinners beware of 
judging of God's attitude toward them from that which 
is assumed by some who call themselves his children. 
They may be Pharisees, and not true sons. Or they 
may be real children ; yet at the moment, by reason of 
the imperfection still adhering to them, they may be 
acting an unfilial part. In any case, we must not allow 
the character and conduct of any man, be he official in 
the church, or whatever else, to prejudice us against 
God. Men may repel us, and refuse to have any thing 
whatever to do with us ; but God will receive us gra- 
ciously, and love us freely. The respectable church- 
members in this respectability-worshipping age may 
stand aloof from us, and may make us feel that they 
would count themselves degraded by holding any fel- 
lowship with us ; but He who talked with the woman of 
Samaria at the well of Sychar, and allowed the woman 
who had been a sinner to wash his feet with her tears, 
and wipe them with the hairs of her head, will in no 
wise cast us out. The minister of the gospel, even, 
may so far forget himself as to speak to us with hard 
and cold severity ; yea, he may treat us with rudeness 
or injustice : but he is only a man, — perhaps a very im- 



THE ELDER BROTHER. 369 

perfect man, — lie is not God. And let us be thankful 
that God is not like him. There is a magnanimous 
mercy and an exalted generosity in God which we look 
for in vain, in the same degree at least, in any man. 

" For the love of God is broader 

Than the measure of man's mind ; 
And the heart of the Eternal 
Is most wonderfully kind." 1 

And, whatever may be the nature of the actions of our 
fellow-men to us, we must not allow them to set us 
against Jehovah. He is always on the outlook for 
returning sinners; and before they have time to con- 
clude their confession, he has already folded them to 
his heart. Do not misinterpret him, therefore, by sup- 
posing that the cold-hearted exclusiveness, which is too 
manifest in many who profess to be his children, is in 
any respect characteristic of him. Regard him as he 
presents himself to you in his Word. Read him as 
he has written himself in the mission and sacrifice of 
his Son ; and, whatever else may be suggested to you 
by the disposition of his professed people, rest you sure 
of this, that his true character is portrayed in this par- 
able, and that Isaiah has not misinterpreted him when 
he says, " Let the wicked forsake his way, and the un- 
righteous man his thoughts ; and let him return unto the 
Lord, for he will have mercy upon him ; and unto our 
God, for he will abundantly pardon." 2 

Finally, let us learn from this whole chapter, that God 
has a sincere, earnest, personal interest in the salvation 
of men. There are no obstacles now to the salvation of 
a sinner, on God's side. If any remain, they lie entirely 
with the sinner himself. With all the solemnity of an 

1 Faber. 2 Isa. lv. 7. 



370 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

oath, Jehovah has said, "As I live, I have no pleasure 
in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn 
from his way, and live ; " l and even more forcibly than 
by that striking asseveration, Jesus Christ has set the 
same truth before us in this incomparable chapter of 
Luke's Gospel. I answer, therefore, all difficulties which 
inquirers may feel about such topics as election, the 
special agency of the Holy Spirit, the sovereignty of 
God, and the like, by bidding them go and read these 
parables. They show that God is in earnest in seeking 
to save lost souls. They prove that every thing about 
him, and done by him, is in the interest of the sinner's 
return. His electing love, his Spirit's work, his sove- 
reignty, are all to be interpreted in the light of this 
chapter, and are all to be understood as designed to 
help and not to hinder the sinner's restoration. They 
are not stumbling-blocks placed in the way of the peni- 
tent, but they are agencies at work in removing obsta- 
cles from his path. See to it, therefore, that you do 
not misunderstand God. Meet every speculative diffi- 
culty arising from the doctrines to which I have referred, 
with this chapter, which has always been regarded as 
one of the " crown jewels " of the Christian Church. 
Silence every foreboding about the reception which 
God may give you, with these, " the first three " of the 
Redeemer's parables. Arise, and go in fullest confi- 
dence to your Father. He will not reject you, but will 
infold you in his forgiving embrace, and say over you, 
in infinite tenderness, and with Divine delight, " This 
my son was dead, and is alive again ; he was lost, and is 
found." 

1 Ezek. xxxiii. 11. 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 371 



XXIV. 

THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 

(Luke xvi. 1-12.) 

The interpretation of this parable has occasioned 
more perplexity to the commentators than any other in 
the Gospels, with perhaps the single exception of that 
of " the laborers in the vineyard." But the difficulty, 
at least so it seems to me, has arisen in great measure 
from the fact that it has too often been regarded from 
a wrong point of view. It is, therefore, incumbent 
upon us, in the very outset, to get a definite and cor- 
rect conception of the circumstances in which it was 
spoken, and of the story which it tells. 

Now, as to the first of these, it is clear from the place 
in which we find it here, that it was addressed to the 
same audience as that which had already listened to 
those three delightful allegories on the consideration of 
which we have been so recently engaged. Like them, 
therefore, it was called forth by certain well-known 
characteristics of the scribes and Pharisees. No doubt, 
in the opening verse of the chapter, it is introduced by 
the words, "he said also unto his disciples;" but, as is 
evident from the application of it made to themselves 
by the Pharisees, in the fourteenth verse, the design of 
our Lord was not only to warn his followers against 
that which was evil in the Pharisees, but also to get at 
the Pharisees through his address to them, if haply they 



872 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

might thereby be led to repentance. The two evil quali- 
ties by which that class of the people was distinguished 
were pride and coveteousness ; and just as, in the Ser- 
mon on the Mount, our Lord passes from the exposure 
of the one of these directly and immediately to that of 
the other; so here the transition is equally rapid from 
the reproof of the exclusiveness which sneered at him 
for receiving sinners, and eating with them, to the con- 
demnation of the worlclliness which insisted on keeping 
to itself that with which it had been intrusted for the 
good of others. 

Even the most cursory reader will observe that there 
is a point of contact between this parable and that 
which precedes it, in the fact, that, while the prodigal 
son is said to have " wasted his substance," the steward 
is accused of having " wasted " his master's " goods : " 
the design of our Lord evidently being, to teach these 
believers in self-righteous respectability that there are 
other ways of misusing the portion which God has 
given us, than by riotous living ; and that he who ap- 
propriates as his own that which he has received for 
behoof of another is as really unfaithful to God as is 
the dissolute man who spends his substance on the 
gratification of appetite. 

The parable thus is an exposure of covetousness, with 
a lesson founded thereon for the children of God. 

The principal figure in the story is a steward, who, 
like Eliezer in the household of Abraham, or Joseph in 
that of Potiphar, had been intrusted by a certain rich 
man with the entire control of his affairs. It would 
seem that this master had the most implicit confidence 
in his servant ; so that it might be said of him, as it is 
of Potiphar with Joseph, "He left all that he had in 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 373 

his steward's hand ; and he knew not aught he had, save 
the bread which he did eat." 1 But after a time such 
evidence was laid before him as proved conclusively to 
him that his confidence had been misplaced. He found 
that he was being systematically robbed by a dishonest 
man ; and therefore he called at once for a reckoning, 
and announced to his steward that he could not longer 
continue in his service. This came upon the defalcator 
like a bolt of lightning from a cloudless sky, and 
brought him at once to a stand-still. What was he to 
do now? It was impossible to establish his innocence. 
He would have to go ; but whither ? How could he 
get another situation, with this stigma upon his name ? 
Manual labor with the spade was out of the question. 
"He could not dig." He had led too effeminate a 
life to be able to make much at that. And though he 
had not been ashamed to steal, he was ashamed to beg. 
There was nothing for it, therefore, but to steal again. 

But this time he would make others sharers in his 
dishonesty ; or, rather, he would use his dishonesty for 
the advantage of others, so that they might be laid 
under such obligations to him that they would be con- 
strained to take some care of him. This was his plan. 
He sent for all who were indebted to his master, and 
systematically reduced their debts, which, as being still 
steward, — though " working his warning," as we would 
say, — he had yet the power to do. He bade one who 
owed a hundred measures of oil, make the bill for fifty ; 
and another who owed a hundred measures of wheat, 
make the bill for eighty, and so on. Knowing his men, 
he did with each as it was most for his advantage to 
do, and thus insured a reception in each of their houses 
for a longer or shorter period, until he should have time 

1 Gen. xxxix. 6. 



374 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAYIOUB. 

to turn his energies into some other direction. Thus 
he tampered with the accounts of his master, apparently 
for the immediate advantage of the debtors, but really 
for his own ultimate benefit. 

This is a much better account of the matter than that 
given by those who would represent him as returning 
in this act of his to a course of honesty. They would 
explain the transaction thus : that he had been accus- 
tomed to charge for a hundred when he had really 
given only fifty or fourscore measures, putting the sur- 
plus into his own pocket (much after the fashion of 
the members of the ring, who, in the building of our 
City Hall, had the contractors' bills made out for one 
amount, but paid by a much smaller one, and, charging 
the community for the larger which was on the face of 
the document, divided the difference among themselves), 
but that now he charged only for the correct number= 
But the objection to this view of the steward's action 
is, that he meant to conciliate the clebtors= Xow, 
the discovery that all the while he had been robbing 
them would only have exasperated them, and would 
have determined them to have nothing more to do with 
him. For in this case they would be in the position in 
which the citizens of New York were when they dis- 
covered the fraud that had been perpetrated upon them ; 
and so we may know what they would have felt at the 
revelation of the manner in which they had been 
robbed. Besides, it was his master whom this steward 
had wronged; not, as in this view of the matter it 
would have been, his master's debtors : and so far from 
having here a return to a course of honesty, we see only 
a continuance in the same kind of robbery which he had 
so long carried on, the simple difference being that it 
looked as if he were now doing- it for the advantage of 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 375 

the debtors, though ultimately it was done, just as it 
had been all along, for his own benefit. 

By some means or other his course became known to 
his master, who had perhaps, by that time, overcome 
the bitterness of his first indignation, so far as to be 
able to look at the humorous side of the affair, and who 
therefore, when he heard of it, said, "What an amaz- 
ingly shrewd fellow he is ! It would be ludicrous if it 
were not so criminal ; and if only his probity had been 
up to the level of his prudence, he might have risen 
honestly to wealth and power." 

That is the story ; and before I leave it, I ask you to 
observe that the commendation of the steward, which 
was confined to the wisdom or prudence which he had 
displayed, was given not by the Lord Jesus Christ, but 
by his own master whom he had so flagrantly wronged; 
and if we read with the Revised Version, " his lord com- 
mended the unjust or unrighteous steward because he 
had done wisely," or shrewdly, we shall rid the phrase 
of ambiguity, and prevent any one from falling into the 
mistake of supposing that the commendation was from 
Christ. 

But now, proceeding to the interpretation, I think it 
must be evident to every one, that this parable, like 
those of the good Samaritan, the friend at midnight, 
and one or two others, is not typical or symbolical, but 
simply illustrative. It is not an allegory, each figure in 
which is to be taken as the analogue of some spiritual 
character; and so, if we begin to ask, Whom does the 
rich man stand for ? who is represented by the steward ? 
whom are we to understand by the debtors? and so 
forth, we shall make a most fantastic, and, indeed, a 
most artificial use of the story. Many have tried this 



876 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

plan ; but when such a biblical student as Dean Plump- 
tre 1 has spent much learned ingenuity in seeking to 
establish that the steward represents the scribes and 
Pharisees in their teachings and ministerial functions, 
who had been intrusted by God, here represented by 
the rich man, with great privileges, to which they had 
been unfaithful, and ends by saying that they were 
commended by the Lord, who hi the outer framework 
of the parable is one of the children of this world, we 
see into what absurdity we must be landed if we follow 
this principle of exposition. For, how can God be in 
any sense represented by one of the children of this 
world ? 

We must, therefore, discard all typical interpretation 
here ; and we find the key to the purpose of the parable 
in the words, " For the children of this world are, in 
their generation, wiser than the children of light." The 
ancients had a proverb to the effect that " It is lawful 
to learn, even from an enemy ; " and something like 
that is exemplified by the Saviour here. His purpose is 
to stimulate his disciples to prudence and energy in the 
prosecution of their high calling, by showing them how 
shrewd and prompt the worldling is in devising and 
carrying out measures to secure his earthly and tem- 
poral ends. Hence he has deliberately selected the 
case of one of " the children of this world." The 
example of a faithful servant might teach many other 
valuable lessons ; but only that of an unscrupulous 
man of the world could give prominence to the earnest- 
ness and sagacity with which those of his class labor to 
gain their objects, and so, as it were, provoke Christians 
to outdo them in those qualities, while laboring for an 

1 In Ellicott's New-Testament Commentary for English Readers, 
vol. i. p. 320. 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 377 

infinitely nobler end. Thus, looking at the whole par- 
able from the standpoint of these words, the very thing 
which stumbles most readers — namely, that Christ 
should have held up the case of a dishonest man in any 
respect as an incentive to his followers — becomes per- 
fectly intelligible, and is seen to be similar to much that 
is current among ourselves. Thus, though my house 
may have been broken into, and robbed of many things 
which I most highly value, I may yet admire the inge- 
nuity and dexterity shown by the burglar in the means 
which he took to find an entrance into my dwelling; 
and I may even go so far as to say to an honest but 
lethargic and unambitious workman that if he could 
only take, in these respects, a leaf out of the robber's 
book, he would soon rise to wealth and eminence. But 
all that is so far from an approval of the character and 
doings of the thief, that it is perfectly consistent with 
my gratification at his consignment to the State's prison 
as the punishment of his crime. 

Thus the singling-out of one quality in a man for 
special commendation is very different from the lauda- 
tion of his character or conduct as a whole. When the 
Saviour said to his followers, " Be ye wise as serpents/' 
he did not thereby commend the other qualities of 
malignity and venomousness which are generally as- 
cribed to these reptiles. He desired them only to imi- 
tate their wisdom. In like manner, when, in the parable 
before us, the Lord uses the shrewdness of this steward 
to point a lesson to his followers, we are not to imagine, 
for a moment, that he makes light of his dishonesty. 
His reasoning, as in the parable of " the friend at mid- 
night," is from the worse to the better, and may be ex- 
panded thus : If a child of this world can show such 
wisdom in providing for his comfort when he is to lose 



THE PABABLES OF OUB SAYIOUB. 

his earthly situation, how much more ought the children 
of light to forecast their future, and seek to secure their 
eternal welfare in that coming emergency when the 
place which now knows them shall know them no 
more ! Perhaps, better than all other interpreters, 
Xeander has caught the spirit of this parable, when he 
distils its essence into these words : " As the children 
of the world aim steadily at their selfish objects, and 
with ever-watchful prudence seize upon the means neces- 
sary to secure them, so the children of light are to keep 
constantly before their eyes the relations of life to the 
Divine kingdom, and to press every thing into their ser- 
vice on its behalf. 55 : 

This steward subordinated all other considerations 
to the attainment of his end. He let no qualms of 
conscience, or protests of his better nature, keep him 
from doing that which would serve his purpose. The 
securing of his own personal comfort was the one great 
object which he had set before him, and nothing what- 
ever was allowed to stand in the way of that. Xow, 
the Christian professes that his great life-aim is the 
formation of a holy character through faith in Jesus 
Christ and obedience unto him. He admits also that 
every thing else ought to be made and kept subordinate 
thereto ; but alas ! he does not always act on that 
admission. Those things which in theory he calls sec- 
ondary, he very often allows to become primary: and 
very frequently he loses sight of the interests of eter- 
nity, in his devotion to those of time. Hence the sin- 
gleness of purpose with which the unscrupulous man 
pursues his object may well be commended to his study, 
and he may be taught thereby to concentrate himself 
and his life upon the " one thing ' 5 of pressing on toward 

1 Life of Christ. Bonn's edition, p. 300. 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 379 

the mark " for the prize of the high calling of God in 
Christ Jesus." 1 

How promptly, too, this steward set about his work ! 
As soon as he resolved, he acted. He "let no grass 
grow beneath his feet," and even insisted on the debtors 
when they came to him writing " quickly." The whole 
scene speaks of haste. What he determined to do, he 
did with his might. But if the soul's interests are infi- 
nitely more valuable than wealth, then they ought to 
be attended to with yet greater promptitude ; and it is 
because so often spiritual things are made, even by 
Christians, to give way to material, and we procrasti- 
nate in the former more frequently by far than in the 
latter, that "the children of this world are in their 
generation wiser than the children of light." 

How well adapted to his end, also, were the means 
which this steward employed ! They were dishonest, 
indeed ; but yet they laid his lord's debtors under such 
obligation, that, for their own interests, they were in a 
manner compelled to give him blackmail. When they 
had accepted his terms, they had put themselves into 
his power; and they had to give him something for 
hush-money. But how little practical sagacity Chris- 
tians often show in the choice of means for the attain- 
ment of their spiritual ends ! They know how necessary 
the services of the sanctuary are for the sustenance of 
their spiritual life ; and yet they attend on them with 
irregularity, and become systematic absentees for half 
the day. They are aware how much the influence of 
intimate companionships affects the growth of holy 
character ; and yet they cultivate the friendship of 
those who have no love of Christ in their hearts, simply 
because they enjoy their brilliant wit, or may profit by 

i Phil. iii. 13, 14. 



380 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

their business patronage. They admit that the choice 
of a partner in trade, or of a business or of a profession 
for life, has much to do with their progress in holiness ; 
and yet they decide in such matters without any regard 
whatever to that fact. Now, if they did not profess to 
be "the children of light,*' there would be no incon- 
sistency in all that ; but to protest in words, that the 
prosecution of the Christian life is their great business 
on earth, and to disregard those things which are inti- 
mately connected with the success of that business, is 
to show, in the domain of spiritual things, a carelessness 
and a folly that are never manifested by worldly men 
in the prosecution of that which is to them the supreme 
good. Can we wonder that the type of Christian char- 
acter is low among us at this rate? If one were to 
attempt to conduct a manufacturing concern or an 
importing trade in such a way, he would very soon find 
himself a bankrupt. Yet, as we have seen, it is just 
thus that many proceed in the formation of a holy char- 
acter ; and unless they alter their course, they will very 
soon be spiritually insolvent. Bankrupt in character ! 
That is the most deplorable of all ruins. My brethren, 
let us take timely warning here ; and, whenever we 
have to decide on matters which intimately concern our 
growth in holiness, let us make our spiritual welfare 
the determining element, lest we put serious obstacles 
in our heavenward way, and give a new illustration of 
the Lord's assertion, that "the children of this world 
are, in their generation, wiser than the children of 
light." Shame on us, that this allegation should be 
ever true ! What have the children of this world to 
stimulate them, that they should surpass us in this 
particular? They are not under the constraining influ- 
ence of the love of Christ. They have no heavenly 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 381 

crown awaiting them on high. They are moved only 
by appetite, or the love of money, or the love of fame, 
or the love of power ; and all of these are things tran- 
sient and temporary as the life of earth. Shall it any 
longer be said that these influences are felt by them to 
be stronger than we feel those to be which come from 
the cross of Calvary and the throne of glory? How 
long shall we live thus, beneath our principles? If 
Baal be God, let us follow Mm ; but if Jehovah, then 
let us follow him. If we are the children of light, let 
us walk as such, and no longer allow it to be said that 
"the children of this world are, in their generation, 
wiser than we." 

That is the general drift and purpose of the lesson 
which the Lord himself has drawn for us from the para- 
ble before us ; but in the verses which follow, from the 
ninth to the thirteenth inclusive, we have a particular 
application of this lesson to the use of money : and we 
must attempt to show you the meaning and pertinence 
of these precepts in this place. 

There is, first of all, this statement uttered with all 
authority and solemnity by the Lord : " And I say unto 
you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of un- 
righteousness ; that when ye fail," — or, as it is in the 
Revised Version, "when it shall fail," — "they may 
receive you into everlasting habitations." By the 
"mammon of unrighteousness," we are very clearly to 
understand money; but why it has been so called by 
Christ, is not so evident. Indeed, I have seen no ex- 
planation of this matter which thoroughly commends 
itself to my acceptance ; and I am not prepared with 
any one of my own. Perhaps the simplest, as it is cer- 



B82 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

tainly the most obvious, is because it is so frequently 
unrighteously acquired, and so much more frequently 
unrighteously regarded as the man's own possession, 
and not as a trust of which he is merely a steward. 
But. however the epithet •• unrighteous " may be ac- 
counted for, the thing which it characterizes is money. 
Xow, there is a time when that shall fail. Death says 
to each man, " Give an account of thy stewardship, for 
thou mayest be no longer steward." We can carry with 
us nothing out of this world. Money cannot, simply 
and only as money, be transferred into the world be- 
yond. But it may be sd used in this world as to add to 
and intensify a Christian's happiness in the next. We 
are familiar with the fact, in our daily lives here, that 
money may become the means of procuring that which 
is better than itself. Thus knowledge is better than 
wealth; yet by a wise use of wealth we may acquire 
knowledge. So, by a judicious employment of money 
as trustees for God, hi communicating to the necessities 
of the saints, we shall secure that those whom we have 
thus relieved shall receive us into everlasting habita- 
tions. This use of money will not purchase our admis- 
sion into heaven < but it will make friends for us there, 
whose gratitude will add to our enjoyment, and increase 
our blessedness. It will not open the gates for our en- 
trance. Only Christ is the door. Through him alone 
can we gain ingress. But it will affect what Peter calls 
the " abundance " of our entrance, for it will secure the 
presence there of those who have been benefited by our 
faithful stewardship : and, chiefest of all, it will be re- 
warded with the approbation of Him who will say, 
'•Inasmuch as ye did it unto one of the least of these 
my brethren, ye did it unto me." It is of grace alone, 
through Christ, that we are permitted to enter heaven ; 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 383 

but once there, the measure of reward will be graduated 
according to that of our faithfulness here as "good stew- 
ards of the manifold bounties of God." Those who have 
been helped and blessed by our service on earth will lead 
us up to the throne, and say, " This is he of whom we 
have often spoken, and to whom we were so much be- 
holden in the life below;" and He who sitteth thereon 
will reply, "Well done : let it be done unto him as unto 
the man whom the King delighteth to honor." Thus, 
though money cannot be taken with us into the future 
life, we yet may so employ it here, in stewardship for 
God, as to send on treasure before us into heaven, in 
the shape of friends, who shall throughout eternity re- 
double and intensify our happiness. Here, therefore, 
is an everlasting advantage obtained, not by the dis- 
honest application of that with which we have been 
intrusted, but by our faithful administration thereof 
as the stewards of the Most High ; and if this truth 
were more thoroughly believed among us, and acted 
upon with any thing like the energy and promptitude 
displayed by this unscrupulous servant, there would be 
such a consecration of wealth throughout the churches 
as would usher in the very dawning of the millennial 
day. 

But let us follow the course of the Saviour's thought 
as he adds, " He that is faithful in that which is least is 
faithful also in much ; and he that is unjust in the least 
is unjust also in much." The connection seems to be 
this : " You may allege that you have too little of this 
world's goods to be much concerned with the truth 
which I have now announced ; but that is a mistake, for 
fidelity does not depend upon the amount intrusted to 
you, but on the use to which that amount, however 
small, is put by you ; and that, again, depends on your 



384 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

sense of responsibility as a steward unto God." The 
faithful man will be true to his trust, whether it is small 
or great; and the unfaithful man will be false to his 
trust, whether it is small or great. Character will re- 
veal itself alike in the least and in the greatest. Hence 
that which is least is intrusted to us for a test of char- 
acter; and fidelity therein is the gateway of our en- 
trance into a larger trust. He who has proved himself 
to be reliable in a smaller sphere is raised to a higher ; 
but he who makes an improper use of minor facilities 
shall not only not be permitted to enjoy greater, but 
shall be deprived of those which he has heretofore pos- 
sessed. This is the principle on which God has pro- 
ceeded in his government of the world. To him that 
hath, shall more be given ; and from him that hath not, 
shall be taken away that which he hatK. Hence the 
Lord Jesus adds, "If therefore ye have not been faith- 
ful in the unrighteous mammon, who will commit to 
your trust the true riches ? And if ye have not been 
faithful in that which is another's, who will give you 
that which is your own ? " That is to say : The money 
which men have here is another's, even God's. In com- 
parison with the abiding treasures of eternity, which 
are the true riches, it is temporal and transient ; and a 
time is coming when it shall fail : but if the man who 
has been intrusted with it has been unfaithful, and has 
appropriated to himself what really belonged to God, 
how can it be expected that God will give him the en- 
during wealth of the skies, which shall be his very own, 
inalienable possession ? 

And lest any one should be tempted to suppose that 
it is possible so to combine both the services of God 
and mammon, as to secure independence of God on 
earth, and happiness with. God in heaven, the Saviour 



THE PRUDENT STEWARD. 385 

is careful to remind his hearers that character is a moral 
unit; that the soul can have but one real master; that, 
if we repudiate responsibility to God for our money, we 
are simply and only the servants of mammon, and that 
as such we shall be dealt with at the last. " No ser- 
vant can serve two masters : for either he will hate the 
one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one 
and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mam- 
mon." Every man must serve some master. There 
are only two masters offered to our choice. These two 
masters are in every respect antagonistic to each other. 
God is love, mammon is selfishness ;. God is holiness, 
mammon is sin ; God stands for the supremacy of the 
spiritual and eternal, mammon insists on the pre-emi- 
nence of the seen and the temporal. These are the 
only masters whom a man can serve ; and being such 
as they are, there can be no compromise between them. 
It is impossible for any one to obey them both at once. 
You must break with the one if you would submit to 
the other. You may serve the one after the other; and, 
indeed, most of those who are now serving God have 
once, in some form or other, been the servants of mam- 
mon. You may serve the one in pretence, and the 
other in reality, as I fear some are doing now. You 
may serve God if so you determine, or you may serve 
mammon if that should be your choice ; but the two 
are so antagonistic, the one to the other, that "ye can- 
not serve God and mammon ; " and if you wish to pre- 
serve your faithfulness as a steward to God, you must 
forever renounce all allegiance to mammon. 

The sum of the teaching of these weighty verses, 
then, is this: There are two kinds of riches, the tran- 
sient and the true, — those which we hold in trust for 
another, and those which are eternally our own ; of 



■H^^iH^H^H^B^^HI 



386 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

these we must speak of the former as that which is 
least, and of the latter as that which is greatest. That 
which is least is intrusted to us now and here, as a test 
of character ; and according as we are or are not faith- 
ful in our management of that, we shall or shall not 
receive that which is greatest hereafter. Faithfulness 
in our management of that which is least requires that 
we should use it for God's glory, in promoting the wel- 
fare of his children and the advancement of his cause ; 
and if we would so use it, we must keep our hearts 
simply and entirely for God as the supreme and only 
Master whom we serve. The devotee of mammon, like 
this unrighteous steward wise in his generation, makes 
every thing bend to the attainment of his worldly pur- 
pose : much more, therefore, should the servant of God 
subordinate every thing to the doing of his Master's 
will ; and when he does that, he will find that out of 
the perishing possessions of earth, he has made imper- 
ishable friends in heaven, who shall add a feature of 
peculiar and ecstatic joy to the happiness of his celes- 
tial life. Men think that they have made great profit 
when, by their money, they have secured more than 
their money's worth: but here through the typical 
they gain the true ; through that which is another's, they 
obtain that which shall be their own; through that 
which is perishing, they get that which is imperishable. 
What a glorious investment! and how blind to our 
own interests we are in neglecting to make it ! 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 387 



XXV. 

THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 

(Luke xvi. 19-31. J 

Probably no one of the Saviour's parables needs to 
be so cautiously handled as this of the rich man and 
Lazarus. The difficulty arises from the fact that the 
latter portion of it refers to the invisible world, regarding 
which its representations have to be taken from the visi- 
ble. Now, wherever the spiritual is expressed in terms 
of the material, we are liable to serious error in the inter- 
pretation of that expression ; and so we need here to be 
specially on our guard. In the exposition which I am 
about to give, therefore, I shall endeavor to bring into 
prominence the great truths which the parable was in- 
tended to emphasize, without pressing into significance 
those features of it which belong to what I may call the 
figurative framework in which it is set. 

Every careful reader of the chapter as a whole will 
perceive at once that the story, on the consideration of 
which we are now to enter, is the complement of that 
of the prudent steward. It treats of the same general 
subject, and was designed to give sharper point to the 
moral which that had enforced, and to deepen the im- 
pression which that had produced. 

True, there are between them certain verses which 
express some very important principles, the pertinence 
of which in this particular connection it is hard to dis- 



:?>S THE PARABLES OE OLE SAVIOUR 

cover ; but the introduction of which in this place may 
:: lained, perhaps, on the supposition that they were 
answers to remarks made by the Pharisees, with the 
view of interrupting, and, if possible, of terminating, 
a discourse which was felt by them to be too personal 
to be quite agreeable. In any case, it would be rash to 
affirm with many that these verses are here out of their 
proper context : for we can see that the assertion, " that 
which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in 
the sight of God," is fearfully illustrated by this para- 
ble: while the statement that "it is easier for he; - en 
and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to fail," 
re-appears in another form, in the words with which the 
story ends : " if they believe not Moses and the proph- 
ets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose 
from the dead." There must therefore be some subtile 
link of association between these verses and that which 
follows them, if our ejes, were keen enough to trace it ; 
but the existence of that is not at all inconsistent with 
the truth of the assertion, already made by us, that this 
parable is the companion and complement of that of 
the prudent steward, and has its interpreting clauses 
in the verses appended by our Lord to that difficult but 

To see that such is the case, you have but to look at 
these verses, and then read the parable. In the first :: 
the verses we have these words : & * I say unto you. Make 
to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteous- 
rhat when it shall fail, they may receive you into 
everlasting habitations;" and in the parable we have 
the history of a man who, though he had the mammon 
of unrighteousness in abundance, failed to employ it in 
that beneficent manner, and so found himselfy after 
death, without a friend, excluded from the habitations 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 389 

of the blessed. In the second of these verses the 
Lord says, " He that is faithful in that which is least is 
faithful also in much ; and he that is unjust in the least 
is unjust also in much ; " and in the parable we have 
unveiled to us the future life of one who was unjust in 
that which was least, and who as a consequence was 
denied the enjoyment of that which is greatest. In the 
third of these verses the Saviour asks the questions, " If 
ye have not been faithful in the unrighteous mammon, 
who will commit to your trust the true riches ? And 
if ye have not been faithful in that which is another's, 
who shall give you that which is your own ? " and in 
the parable we have the case of a man who was unfaith- 
ful in the use of that money which was not his but 
God's, and who ultimately was refused the true, abid- 
ing, personal, and inalienable riches of eternal blessed- 
ness. Thus, like that of the steward, this parable 
treats of the use of money; and the difference between 
the two is, that, while the one shows how riches laid 
out beneficently in stewardship for God may add to the 
blessedness of the soul in heaven, the other illustrates 
how wealth unfaithfully and selfishly employed must 
increase the misery of the lost in the place of perdition. 

The story itself consists of a series of contrasts, with 
a practical application from them. 

The first contrast shows us a rich man in a home of 
luxury and selfishness, expending every thing on his 
own enjoyment, so that what in other men's experience 
was an exceptional thing was the commonplace of his 
life, for " he was clothed in purple and fine linen, and 
fared sumptuously every day ; " while over against him 
we have a miserably poor man, laid at his gate, wasted 
with want, and so helpless with disease that he could do 
nothing for himself, — could not even drive away from 



390 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

him the dogs who licked his sores. At the very gate 
of abundance, he " desired " to be fed with the crumbs 
which fell from the table of the rich man ; but it is not 
said that he received any, and we may therefore, per- 
haps, conclude that he was systematically neglected by 
the occupant of the palace. Now, that one case is given 
as representing the habit of this wealthy man's life. It 
was a typical instance of his thoughtless indifference 
to the claims of others on him. Other opportunities 
brought before him were all ignored by him in the same 
way. It was his custom to " pass by " want and suffer- 
ing " on the other side." Not simply therefore for his 
neglect in this particular case, but for the character of 
which that was an indication, and which was thoroughly 
selfish, because he had no sense of his stewardship to 
God, is he here held up to condemnation. 

The second contrast is in the matter of their death 
and burial. One event, namely death, comes alike to 
all; and both of these men died. But no notice is 
taken of the beggar's burial. He was hurried away, it 
may be, roughly and unfeelingly, by the city officials, to 
the " potter's field " of the time, in some such spirit as 
that indicated in the words of the song, — 

" Rattle his bones 
Over the stones, 
He's but a pauper 
Whom nobody owns." 

But the rich man had a funeral, ostentatious probably, 
and expensive, like that described by Southey with 
such withering scorn; and his body may have been 
laid in a tomb massive as a temple, and more costly 
than many a palace. 

But now comes the third contrast. The Saviour 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 391 

follows the spirits of both to Hades, the state of the 
disembodied, or, as the word itself properly means, the 
state of the unseen ; bnt here we cease to deal with 
literal history, and enter into the section where diffi- 
culty especially emerges. We cannot speak of the 
spiritual except in words which have already acquired 
certain significance in the material; and every one 
knows that in seeking to instruct others we must con- 
form to the modes of thought to which they have been 
accustomed. Now, the conception of the disembodied 
state entertained by the Jews of the Saviour's day was 
that of a place divided into two portions, one for the 
spirits of the just, and one for the spirits of the unjust. 
The former was often spoken of among them as Abra- 
ham's bosom ; and the latter was regarded by them as 
a place of torment different from, yet kindred to, that 
Gehenna of fire which was viewed by them as the final 
abode of the lost. Now, the purpose of the Saviour in 
this parable was to illustrate the truth that this rich 
man, having proved unfaithful to his trust in the use 
of his money, had no friend to receive him after death 
into the everlasting habitations of heaven ; and he very 
naturally ran his illustration into the mould of the con- 
ception of Hades which was current among the people 
at the time. It would not have been intelligible to 
them otherwise ; but just because of this, we now are 
apt to misunderstand its meaning. The beggar is car- 
ried — not in body, of course, but in spirit — by the 
angels to Abraham's bosom; and the rich man finds 
himself in the place of torment. So far all is plain. 
But when it is said that "he lifted up his eyes, and 
saw Abraham afar off, and Lazarus in his bosom," we 
see at once that the literal has passed into the figura- 
tive, that the place has given place to him after whom 



392 TEE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

it was named, and what follows is simply designed to 
show that this rich man had made no friends who could 
stand him in good stead in his extremity, and was left 
unrelieved to bear his doom. His cry to Abraham, and 
Abraham's conversation with him, do not warrant us 
in drawing the conclusion that the saved and the lost 
will be in sight of each other in the disembodied state, 
or that they will have any communication of any sort 
with each other. The residuum of truth which re- 
mains to us out of this part of the parable is, that 
whereas if this wealthy man had been a faithful steward 
of God's trust, he would have had in Lazarus and all 
the others whom, as God's servant, he had assisted, so 
many friends to welcome him, he found himself, because 
of his unfaithfulness, left to hapless torment. He let 
Lazarus lie uncared-for outside of his door on earth ; 
and now he is left outside of heaven, with the sad re- 
flection that no one either can or will relieve his misery, 
even by so much as a drop of water would cool a burn- 
ing tongue. 

The moral of the story follows in the conversation 
between Abraham and the once rich man. The latter 
asks that Lazarus may be sent to relieve him : but re- 
ceives for answer, first, that such a request was unrea- 
sonable, inasmuch as he had made his own choice of 
what his good things would be when he was on earth, 
and now he must abide by the results of that choice ; 
even as Lazarus, who from his name, which signifies 
" God is my help," must be understood as having made 
God his portion, was now enjoying the blessed conse- 
quences of that wise determination. But, second, while 
it was thus unreasonable in him to ask that Lazarus 
should be sent to his relief, it was impossible for Laz- 
arus to go even if he wished ; for there was no passing 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 393 

to and fro between the saved and the lost. No one 
could cross the gulf which God had fixed between the 
two. Now, of course, here is much of figure. The 
flame and the gulf may not be literal. The one is the 
symbol of a spiritual anguish as intense to the soul as 
the pain of fire is to the quivering flesh ; and the other 
is the material emblem of that Divine decree which shall 
forever separate the saved from the unsaved. The letter 
is figure. But the unreasonableness of the request of 
the lost man, and the impossibility of complying with 
it on the part of the saved, — these are the spirit 
in the letter, and these are real, so that if we reject them 
the whole parable becomes unmeaning. 

Again, when we learn that this rich man proceeds to 
plead for his five brothers, we almost begin to feel that 
his punishment has tended to soften his spirit, and to 
make him thoughtful for others ; but when we read en, 
we discover that his design is rather to vindicate him- 
self than to save them. It was as much as to say, " If 
I had been properly warned I never would have been 
here." But Abraham's answer was sufficient to silence 
all such God-upbraiding words : " They have Moses and 
the prophets : let them hear them." " If you had obeyed 
Moses in your life, and sought to carry out all his pre- 
cepts, you would have been with me ; and though you 
think that 4 if one went unto them from the dead, they 
would repent,' you are entirely at fault ; for those who 
repudiate Moses will always find some plausible reason 
for rejecting the testimony even of one who rises from 
the dead." Here again, you see, the form, which is that 
of a dialogue between Abraham and the rich man, is 
figurative ; but the substance, which is that every man 
has sufficient light for the discharge of the duties which 
God requires at his hand, is reality, — true for the Jew, 



394 THE PARABLE- 722 SAVI'. 

true for the heathen, and true for the Christian, in 
everv age. and for all time. 

Such is our analysis : this story; and if it be cor- 
rect, you will see at Mice that this is not an allegory 

in which the rich man represents one spiritual class, 
and the beggar another, as, in the parable of the sower, 
the different kinds of ground stand for different sorts 
: _;spel hearers. Rathe: it is dimply an illustrative 
story told to give emphasis to the importance of mak- 
ing to ourselves friends out of the mammon of unright- 
eousness, that when it fails they niay receive us into 
everlasting habitations. We have had similar instances 
in the parables of the friend at midnight, the good 
Samaritan, and the unjust steward; and when we view 
it in this way, as illustrative and not symbolical, it be- 
comes amazingly clear and suggestive. 

Moreover, if our analysis of the story be correct, we 
can have no difficulty in separating the merely figur- 
ative and dramatic from the truths of permanent im- 
portance which it was intended to teach. Thus, with 
the key which I have given you for the unlocking of 
its meaning, you will be in no danger of falling into the 
mistake of supposing that it lends any countenance to 
the ideas that the rich man will be condemned simply 
on account of his riches, and that the poor man will be 
saved simply because of his >verty. It is not the hav- 
ing of riches that is here condemned, but the neglect 
to use them for God and in his service. And poverty, 
in and of itself, is not a virtue. There is as much in- 
iquity among the poor as among the rich. Not what a 
man has, but what a man is, counts before God. Riches 
test character in one way, iverty tests it in another; 
and the character that stands the test in either condi- 
tion will be approved. If the rich man esteems the 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 395 

fayor of God above all wealth, and. uses his money as 
God requires, he will be accepted ; if the poor man, 
hardened by his poverty, turns away from God, and be- 
comes a regardless, scoffing, impious man, he will be 
rejected. Our relation to God in Christ is the deciding 
element. If we keep that close, despite the tempta- 
tions that come from the deceitfulness of riches, we 
shall be eternally with God, no matter though on earth 
we may have been immensely wealthy ; but if we re- 
pudiate that relation, and live in defiance of God, we 
shall be forever with the lost, no matter though here 
we may have been the poorest of the poor. 

But now, leaving these expository details, let me, in 
the light of the results at which we have arrived, gather 
up the lessons of the parable, under these three heads : 
the sin, the inexcusableness, and the punishment of this 
rich man. 

I. Let us inquire, then, first, wherein consisted the sin 
of this rich man. It is frequently asserted, that we have 
here an arbitrary condemnation of one whose sole fault 
was that he was wealthy; but those who speak thus 
only reveal that they have failed to see the great truth 
which here the Redeemer purposed to illustrate. No 
doubt the rich man was not positively vicious. He is 
not charged with drunkenness or adultery or open im- 
morality. He did not put his riches, so far as appears, 
to an injurious use. All that is implied is, that he 
failed to employ them as God's trustee, for the benefit 
of his fellow-men, and for the glory of Him to whom, 
of right, they belonged. He kept them to himself, and 
spent them simply and only on his own enjoyment. He 
was himself the centre of all his efforts; and that which 
was another's, intrusted to him for a special purpose, 



396 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

he regarded as his own, and used as such. The beggar 
that sat neglected at his gate is the little feature which 
indicates his great unfaithfulness. He did no more for 
the outlying world than he did for the poor diseased 
Lazarus. He was like the wicked servant in the other 
parable, who kept his talent to himself ; with this differ- 
ence, that instead of hiding it in a napkin, and burying 
it in the earth, he spent it on his own table and attire. 
He was like the lady of whom Thomas Hood has sung, 
who was surrounded by all the comforts of affluence, 
and had in her hands the means of providing for the 
orphan, and making glad the widow's heart, but who 
never thought of doing such beneficent work until 
when in her dream, confronted with death and behold- 
ing the many sufferers in this world of woe, she solilo- 
quized thus, — 

" For the blind and the cripple were there, 
And the babe that pined for bread ; 

And the homeless man, and the widow poor 
Who begged to bury her dead, — 

The naked, alas ! that I might have clad, 
The famished I might have fed. 

" Each pleading look, that long ago 

I scanned with a heedless eye, 
Each face was gazing as plainly there 

As when I passed it by. 
Woe, woe, for me if the past should be 

Thus present when I die ! 

" The wounds I might have healed, 

The human sorrow and smart, — 
And yet it never was in my soul 

To play so ill a part. 
But evil is wrought by want of thought, 

As well as want of heart." 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 397 

He was a type of those to whom it shall be said at 
last, "Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least 
of these, ye did it not to me." And the lesson of his 
history, as here recorded, is that to live for one's self 
alone is to lose one's self. Wondrous paradox, yet 
sober truth ! The most enlightened self-interest is that 
which crucifies self. " He that loveth his life shall lose 
it ; but he that willeth to lose it for Christ's sake, shall 
keep it unto life eternal." 

II. But now let us look at the inexcusableness of 
this rich man. When he wished that Lazarus should 
be sent to his five brothers, to warn them lest they 
also should come to the place of torment, there was an 
implied assertion that if he had known, he would not 
have lived as he had done. It was as if he wished to 
cast the blame on God ; but when Abraham said, " They 
have Moses and the prophets ; let them hear them ; " 
and again, " If they believe not Moses and the prophets, 
neither will they be persuaded though one rose from 
the dead," — he furnished a satisfactory reply. God 
gives every man enough light for the performance of 
the duties which he requires at his hand. He "doth 
not exact day-labor, light denied ; " and no one will be 
condemned at last for not doing that which he never 
could have known he was to do. Responsibility is for 
each man proportioned to his opportunity. If one does 
not perform that which the little light he had might 
have made clear to him, the reason for his neglect is 
not the want of light, but the want of will; and that, 
no amount of extra light would have removed. Here, 
again, it is true that " he that is faithful in that which 
is least is faithful also in much, and he that is unjust 
in the least is unjust also in much." This man had the 



398 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

writings of Moses and the prophets in his hands. Very 
probably he was a regular worshipper in the synagogue, 
and heard them statedly read there. In any case he 
had the means of becoming acquainted with them, if 
he had chosen to avail himself of them. And though 
they contained little about the future life, they said as 
much regarding it as, if it had referred to his worldly 
business, would have made him take precautionary 
measures. Moreover, though they said little compara- 
tively about the future state, they were exceedingly 
full and clear about the duties which, as laid upon them 
by God, the rich owed to the poor in the present life. 
There was in them the clearest light in that department 
of morality, and to that light he had closed his eyes ; 
therefore he was righteously condemned. He knew 
what God required ; he knew also that he was respon- 
sible to God for the doing of that ; and nothing more 
was needed, if he had chosen, to set him on its diligent 
performance : therefore he was without excuse. 

But if this was the case with him, who had only the 
Jewish scriptures, how much more will it be so with 
us, if, having the complete revelation of the new cov- 
enant, we should still thoughtlessly live to ourselves, 
and disregard alike our responsibility to God, and our 
duties to our fellow-men ! For to us now, One has 
come even from the dead, and sealed, as indubitably 
true, all the statements which his gospel contains. Nay, 
more : by his own pure, divine, unselfish life, during 
which " he went about doing good," — healing the sick, 
cleansing the lepers, feeding the hungry, instructing 
the ignorant, shedding joy and happiness everywhere 
around him, even while he was bearing the sins of the 
world, — until at length, in solemn self-sacrifice, he 
offered himself to the death of the cross, he has left 



THE BICII MAN AND LAZAEUS. 399 

us an example, that we should follow his steps. Shall 
it be, then, that with such a pattern before us we shall 
seek to live for ourselves, and lose our entrance into 
the everlasting habitations, for the poor, paltry ambi- 
tion to amass a fortune which we must leave behind 
us, or to make a position which we must give up at last, 
or to enjoy the amusements and pleasures and luxuries 
of the world, which perish in the using ? There is no 
fortune so noble as that which is made in doing good ; 
no position so exalted as that which is reached by him 
who belongs to the peerage of benevolence ; no pleas- 
ure so pure as that which is enjoyed by him who, imbib- 
ing the spirit of the Lord Jesus, seeks to mitigate the 
miseries of his fellow-men, and finds his life-work in 
the lessening of human suffering and the salvation of 
immortal souls. Up, then, and give yourselves to this 
Christ-like labor. Live every day for God, in the ser- 
vice of his people, and the promotion of his cause. So 
shall you escape the corrupting and down-dragging 
influences of the world, and find your place at last by 
the side of your Redeemer. But if with such a clear 
revelation before you, and such a glorious ensample 
above you, all your thought is still about yourselves, 
then your guilt is deeper than that of Dives, and your 
doom will be heavier than that which fell on him. 

III. But now, finally, let us glance solemnly at the 
rich man's punishment. Now, here, as I have said, we 
must beware of supposing that in the future life things 
will be literally as they are here described. I do not 
believe that it is possible, in our present speech, to por- 
tray exactly what the future state will be ; and most 
certainly our Lord does not here make the attempt to 
do any thing of that kind. What he has done is, under 



400 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the guise of this story, to convey to us truthful impres- 
sions, though the mode in which he has done that may 
be — nay, from the very nature of the case, must be — 
figurative. But, stripping away all mere figure and 
embellishment, two things about this man's doom seem 
to me to be positively certain. These are, the intensity 
of its agony, and the eternity of its duration. This is 
an awful subject, and I do not wish to dwell upon its 
dread details : nevertheless, the truest, tenderest kind- 
ness is to set the meaning of this parable, in this regard, 
fairly and fully before you. The anguish of this man 
is implied in his use of the word "flame." Now, as he 
was then in the state of disembodied spirits, we cannot 
understand that he was in material fire. But it is a 
mistake to suppose that by taking this figuratively we 
thereby deprive it of its terror. No ! to a rightly con- 
stituted mind, we only increase that thereby ; for the 
figure is always less than the reality, and in the union 
of memory perfectly unsealed, with conscience fully 
awakened, we have all that is needed to produce in 
the soul such distress as is here figuratively described. 
But there is further revealed here, the eternity of 
the duration of this punishment. I cannot see how 
else the 'fixity of that gulf is to be understood. It is 
as true that no change of place is possible to those 
who are here described, as it is that if Moses and the 
prophets be not heard, the mission of one from the 
dead will be in vain. For both of these announce- 
ments stand on the same plane. I know that it is 
said that this is in Hades, — the state of disembodied 
spirits, — intervening between this life and the general 
resurrection and judgment. Be it so. I accept the rep- 
resentation. But that completely explodes the modern 
notion of Dorner and others, that probation continues 



THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 401 

through that state, and is only terminated at the resur- 
rection and the final judgment. For, how can there be 
probation, with this impossibility of passing from one 
place to the other ? There is here no possible probation 
in the intermediate state ; and there is not a single 
word in all the Scriptures which indicates that there 
will be probation after the judgment, — not one. That 
ought to be enough, and with that I leave the sub- 
ject to stand before you in its own dread and awful 
solemnity. 

But I cannot conclude my discourse without remind- 
ing you, that if you live faithfully and lovingly for 
God in Jesus Christ, then, no matter how lowly your 
lot may have been upon the earth, you shall have 
everlasting blessedness and glory in heaven. Lazarus 
was not saved because he was poor, any more than 
the rich man was condemned because he was wealthy. 
But in his mean and pitiful estate he had served his 
God, finding his help in Jehovah ; and lo ! at death 
he is carried by angels to Abraham's bosom. Courage, 
then, ye humble ones. God will not forget your work 
of faith and labor of love. No matter what be your 
lot here, if you can say with Paul, " For me to live is 
Christ," you will be with Christ at last. And He who 
did not spurn the meanest of the people from him on 
earth, will himself receive you into the fellowship of his 
glory. 



402 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 



XXVI. 

THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 

(Luke xvii. 7-10.) 

This parable lias not received from Christians gen- 
erally the measure of attention to which it is entitled. 
Few of us are conscious of having derived spiritual in- 
spiration from the study of it ; and in some of the best 
expository works on the parables of our Lord, as, for 
example, in the recent valuable one of Goebel, it is 
entirely omitted. This neglect may be owing, in some 
degree, to the superior attractiveness of many of the 
Saviour's other allegories, the lessons from which are 
more palatable to most of us than those which are here 
enforced ; but it is due perhaps, most of all, to the diffi- 
culty which has been universally felt in its interpreta- 
tion. Still, the view which, under any feasible exposi- 
tion, it gives of the exactions of the Christian life, and 
the spirit in which these are to be met by us, is so im- 
portant, that, no matter what our success may be in its 
explanation, we may profitably spend a little time in 
its examination. 

Whether the context furnishes any key to the solu- 
tion of its meaning, is a question on which the most 
opposite opinions have been maintained. On the one 
hand, it has been held by some, that, as the sayings 
which precede it have been introduced in other connec- 
tions by Matthew and Mark, they are here grouped to- 



THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 403 

gether by Luke on no other principle than that he wished 
to preserve them, and might as well bring them in at this 
point as at any other ; and even such a writer as Godet, 
who is in this instance followed by Bruce, calls them, as 
I think, somewhat irreverently, " a remnant scrap at the 
bottom of the portfolio," which the Evangelist has here 
delivered to us without any introduction. Others, how- 
ever, with much greater probability have alleged, that, 
although used by our Lord on other occasions, these ut- 
terances form one discourse here. Now, as there are 
some undeniable instances in which the Saviour re- 
peated, under new circumstances, sentiments which he 
had already expressed in other relations, I have no hesi- 
tation in believing that here we have a new and distinct 
address, though the separate portions of which it is 
composed had been before employed by him at differ- 
ent times and for other purposes. This view is con- 
firmed by the fact that we can easily trace at least 
some links of association between its several parts. 
Thus the opening verses deal with the causing of others 
to stumble, and these are followed by precepts as to 
how his disciples should act towards those who should 
trespass against them. Now, we can easily see that we 
have in these two sections both sides of the same sub- 
ject presented ; for the one relates to the giving, and 
the other to the taking, of offence. The injunction to 
forgive a penitent brother, even if he should trespass 
against them seven times in a day, evoked from the dis- 
ciples the pra} r er, "Lord, increase our faith," because 
they felt that only through the possession of a larger 
measure of that grace, could they attain to the obedience 
of such a command. Their prayer, again, led to the 
answer, " If ye had faith as a grain, of mustard-seed, 
ye might say unto this sycamore-tree, Be thou plucked 



404 THE PARABLES OE OUB SAVIOUR 

up by the root, and be thou planted in the sea ; and 
it should obey you." Then. Lest they should be puffed 
up with pride at the very idea of their accomplishing 
such great things, he goes on in this parable to impress 
upon them the arduous and unceasing nature of the 
service which was required of them as his disciples. 
and the spirit and temper in which that should be ren- 
dered. 

This being the main purpose of the parable, the illus- 
tration is taken from the state of things then actually 
-xi-ring upon the earth. The relation between master 
and servant was not one of contract, but of ownership. 
The slave was not hired to do just so much and no more ; 
but he actually belonged to his master, who had an 
absolute right to all Ms time and all his exertions. But 
the Lord, in using this relation for the purpose of mak- 
ing plain the point which he desired to enforce, says 
nothing whatever of its propriety or lawfulness. That 
was not the matter which was then before hi m ; but 
taking it just as it was, without pausing to discuss the 
question of the rightfulness of slavery, he employs it to 
impress upon the minds of his hearers the truth which 
he wished particularly to emphasize. Such a bond- 
servant, then, who belonged to his master, is described 
as having just returned from out-door labor in the field, 
where he had been following the plough, or keeping the 
sheep: and the question is asked, whether his master 
would say to him, ki Come at once, and sit down to 
meat," or whether he would not rather address him 
after this fashion: -Make ready wherewith i"may sup. 
and gird thyself, and serve me till I have eaten and 
drunken, and afterward thou shalt eat and drink.'* 
Then the further question is raised. " Doth the master 
thank the servant because he did the things that were 



THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 405 

commanded ? " and in some manuscripts the answer, " I 
trow not," is inserted ; but whether we follow the Author- 
ized Version in retaining these words, or the Revised 
Version in rejecting them, it is equally clear that a 
negative answer is expected, and is the true one ; so 
that the moral follows, as an inference from the whole : 
" Even so ye also, when ye shall have done all the things 
that are commanded you, say, We are unprofitable ser- 
vants : we have done that which it was our duty to do." 
Now, it is undeniable that we have in this parable 
much that is startling, and apparently inconsistent with 
the Saviour's teaching : for example, the haughty bear- 
ing of the master toward his tired slave, and the un- 
appreciative spirit in which he receives the services 
rendered to him, are not at all in keeping with the 
representations elsewhere made of the kindness shown 
by God to those who sincerely and lovingly seek to do 
his will. Accordingly, I am not surprised that many 
commentators have shrunk from any interpretation 
which would even seem to admit that this master is in 
any sense the representative of God. To escape from 
that, therefore, some have maintained that we have 
here simply an exposure of the spirit of legalism ; that, 
as one has said, 1 " Christ descends to the moral plane 
of his auditors, and seeks to convict them, not by prov- 
ing their principles to be wrong, but by apparently 
accepting and using them. He addresses himself to the 
Pharisees, or to the spirit of Phariseeism in his own dis- 
ciples, of which the essence was, and is ever, a claim to 
be received and rewarded by God for work's sake. And 
he says in effect something like this : ' You claim to be 
the servant of God ? '— ' Yes.' — ' A faithful servant ? ' 
— 4 Yes.' — 4 On that ground entitled to a seat at the 

1 Abbott, in loco. 



406 THE PABABLES OF OUB SAVIOUB. 

table of the King ? ' — ' Yes.' — ' Do you treat your ser- 
vants thus? When they come in from the field, do 
you make haste to welcome them ? to serve them ? or 
to thank them ? I trow not. But if you are a ser- 
vant, you must be content with a servant's recompense.'' 
And so the moral of the parable, in this view of it, is 
not that the Christian is to say, 4 We are unprofitable 
servants,' but rather that he is not a servant at all, but 
a son, and is to serve for love's sake, and not for re- 
ward." Now, all this is a true description of the case 
as between the Christian and his God, and we may our- 
selves come out to a result not very different in the 
end ; but it does seem to me, that in making the infer- 
ence from the whole parable that the Christian is not 
a servant, but a son, such a view of the teaching takes 
all the force out of the words, " Even so ye also, when 
ye shall have done all the things which are commanded 
you, say, We are unprofitable servants." Besides, 
while the Christian is a son, it is not to be forgotten 
that he is also, in a very important sense, a servant. 
Repeatedly in the parables of our Lord, he is repre- 
sented by a laborer and a servant ; and Paul in all his 
epistles styles himself a the bond-servant of the Lord 
Jesus Christ : " so that there must be some appropriate- 
ness in bringing that side of the truth into view. We 
are not prepared, therefore, to accept this interpretation. 
Others have supposed that the parable, instead of 
setting forth how God actually deals with any one indi- 
vidual, describes how he might have dealt with all men. 
But neither can we rest in that theory of the case ; for 
Christ is dealing with actualities, and guarding his hear- 
ers specially against a spirit of pride and self-congratula- 
tion, and the one thing on which he wishes to con- 
centrate our attention is not the spirit in which God 



THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 407 

deals with his servants, but rather the spirit in which 
we should serve God, — not what God thinks of our 
work, but rather how we should regard it ourselves. 
The Christian belongs to God. He is bought with a 
price. Whatever doubt there may be about the legality 
of any one man's title to property in his fellow-man, — 
and to me there is no question of its absolute injustice, 
— there can be none about God's title to all that the 
Christian is and has, and can do. He is the " possession 
of God's purchase." Nay, he himself admits that he is 
"not his own;" he has not only been " bought with a 
price " by God, but he has by his own voluntary act 
consecrated himself to God. Therefore God has a right 
to all the service he can render. And, when he has ren- 
dered it all, he may not indulge in self-complacency as 
if he had done any thing extraordinary, or had deserved 
any special commendation ; for even at the best he has 
done no more than he ought to have done, since soul, 
body, and spirit, in all places and in all cases, every- 
where and at all times, he is the property of God. 

This, in my judgment, is the simple significance of 
the parable. It tells the Christian how he is to think 
of himself, but it says nothing of what his Lord thinks 
of him. The portion of the story which tells of the 
gruffness and thanklessness of the master belongs to 
what I may call u the blind side " of the parable. It 
belongs to what may be styled the drapery of the par- 
able, and is not to be pressed into significance. The 
story has no typical meaning Godward. Its entire 
teaching is on the human side. It looks earthward, not 
heavenward. It draws an inference for the servants, 
but it says nothing of the Lord. And though the ser- 
vants are to regard their work and themselves with 
humility, as unprofitable, that does not imply that God 



408 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

will not give them both commendation and reward. 
This is only one side of the matter, — the side which is 
true to our experience in this world, and which gives us 
the advice that is appropriate thereto. 

But there is another side to the case, the heavenly ; 
and in order to complete the presentation of the subject 
we must take that in also. It is set before us in Luke 
xii. 35-37 : " Let your loins be girded about, and your 
lights burning ; and ye yourselves like unto men that 
wait for their lord, when he will return from the wed- 
ding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may 
open unto him immediately. Blessed are those servants 
whom the lord, when he cometh, shall find watching : 
verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and 
make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth 
and serve them." What a contradiction ! do you say ? 
Nay, there is no discrepancy: for the parable before 
us shows us the Christian toiling on earth, and gives us 
what should be Ins own estimate of himself and of his 
work ; while the words which I have just read describe 
the Christian's welcome into heaven, where he shall 
be waited upon by his Lord, in token of gratitude and 
affection. 

Having thus, as I trust, made the meaning of our 
parable perfectly clear to you, let me only now detain 
you for a few minutes, while I seek to bring out some 
profitable hints which are suggested by this method of 
interpretation. 

I. There is, first of all, the continuous obligation of 
the Christian life. This servant had been all day in 
the field. He had returned weary and hungry, needing 
rest and food ; but instead of being permitted to sat- 
isfy his wants, and lie down to enjoy repose, he must 



THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 409 

forthwith address himself to another sort of labor. He 
must make ready his master's repast, and gird himself, 
and wait on him at table while he eats and drinks. 
Now, arduous as this lot of his surely was, there are 
aspects of the Christian life in which it appears to be 
no less exacting. The slave could not say with truth 
that his work was ever done. He had to keep himself 
always at the call of the master, by night as well as 
by day; and whensoever that call might come, at even- 
ing or midnight, at cock-crowing or in the morning, 
he had to rise, and do what was commanded him. But 
it is the same with the Christian and his Lord. At no 
moment is he absolved from obligation to serve ; and 
even when he has been exhausted by some heavy and 
protracted labor, he is still under obligation as heavy 
as ever to live the Christian life. His day is not one 
merely of twelve hours ; but throughout the twenty- 
four he must be ready for any emergency, and must 
meet that at the moment when it rises. Always he is 
under obligation to his Lord; and "without haste," but 
also "without rest," he must hold himself absolutely 
at the disposal of his Master. When the physician, on 
his return from his daily round of visits, with mind 
exhausted and body fatigued, is met at his door by 
an urgent summons to the bedside of one who has 
been suddenly stricken by severe illness, he feels him- 
self constrained to set out at once, and give what help 
he may to the man who has thus called him. So the 
Christian is to be always at the call of his Lord ; and 
no matter though the command may come at the most 
inconvenient time, he is to be willing to comply with 
it. This is the exaction of his calling. He belongs 
altogether to the Lord ; and when He needs him, every 
thing else must be set aside in order that His will may 



410 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

be done. It seems hard; and yet there are many of 
us who must admit that this is an exact description 
of our own experience. Our labor is never done. The 
workingman, so called, sticks out for his ten, or per- 
haps eight, hours a day; and when these ha T *e been 
put in, the rest of the evening and the night are his 
own ; or, if he is required to give any portion of that 
reserved season up, a new contract is entered into, and 
he is paid so much for " overtime." But as between 
the Christian and his Lord there is no " overtime ; " 
for all his time he is his Lord's, and he never can allege 
that any portion of himself or of his day is absolutely 
his own. He can never have " a day off." There are 
no holidays in Christ's service ; and, no matter how 
weary we may be in it, our weariness is no reason why 
we may not be required to do something else. This 
applies to the regular work of the Christian life: for, 
wherever a believer is, his work is to be a Christian : 
to manifest the graces of character which the situation 
requires ; to do the precise thing which the case de- 
mands ; to preserve, in the midst of all temptations, 
loyalty to his Lord ; to act in every thing as it becom- 
eth the gospel of Christ, — in one expressive phrase, 
" whatsoever he does, in word or in deed, to do all in 
the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, giving thanks to 
God and the Father by him." 

Other servants may have some respite. The very 
slave is almost always sure of his sleep, and may be free 
in his dreams ; the soldier is " mustered out " after the 
war ; the man of business retires after he has made his 
competency; the professor may become "emeritus," 
and live on his annuity : but the Christian is to be a 
Christian, and to hold himself at the disposal of his 
Lord, while he lives. His fight continues while life 



THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 411 

lasts ; his obligation to attend his Master's call abides 
till he hears that last call of all, " Come up hither." He 
is to be always waiting and watching, until death. 

Now, this may seem a hard saying ; but it is true, and 
it is well that we should look it fairly in the face. The 
Christian vocation is no holiday affair. It is, on the 
contrary, a most arduous and exacting thing ; a thing 
that has no attractions for human indolence ; a thing 
loftier in its ideal than any standard of duty which 
men may set up for themselves. It demands our all, 
at all times, for Christ, and that we hold ourselves by 
day and by night at his disposal, for the doing of his 
will. 

II. Now, with this view of our calling clearly before 
us, observe, in the second place, what light the parable 
throws on the spirit in which such demands ought to be 
met by us. And here it is pertinent to say, first of all, 
that we must meet them with patience. There must be 
no murmuring or whimpering over our lot, as if it were 
tremendously hard, and as if we were undergoing a 
species of martyrdom. We are not to pity ourselves as 
if we were being oppressed or overborne, but to go for- 
ward to that which is required of us, courageously, 
patiently, and perseveringly. 

And then, on the other side, we are not to stroke 
ourselves down complacently after we have met the 
demand upon us, as if we had done something extraor- 
dinary. Pride after toil is just as much out of place 
here as murmuring under toil. As one 1 has well said, 
" There is no enemy to all high attainment so deadly as 
self-satisfaction." We are not to think about ourselves 
at all, but of God, of what he has been to us and what 

1 Bruce : Parabolic Teaching of Christ, p. 171. 



412 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

he has done for us, and of what we owe to him ; and 
then, when we get to a right and proper estimate of that, 
our most arduous efforts and our most costly sacrifices 
will seem so small in comparison, that we shall be ready 
to exclaim, " We are unprofitable servants ! All that we 
have done does not begin to measure the greatness of 
our indebtedness to Him for whom we have done it." 
Thus, though the language which the parable puts into 
the mouth of a Christian is that of a servant, one must 
be something higher than a mere servant before he will 
use it. For, to quote again from Bruce, 1 " It is true of 
slaves, that they are unprofitable ; but it is not true 
of them that they confess themselves to be so. . . . It is 
only the free man who makes such a confession, and in 
the very act of making it he shows himself to be free." 
Thus, in order to comply with the exactions of the 
Christian life, in the spirit which this parable recom- 
mends, we have to become reconciled to God through 
Jesus Christ. It is the sense of redemption and the 
consciousness of regeneration whereby we have become 
no longer servants, but sons, alone, that will impel us 
to reckon ourselves as not our own, and to do with- 
out a murmur, and without the least self-complacency, 
all that God requires at our hands. The man whose 
idol is duty will say, after he has satisfied its demand, 
" I have done my duty, and my work is finished." But 
he whose impulse is love will never be satisfied with 
what he has accomplished, but will go on to new efforts 
and new sacrifices, just to give expression to that affec- 
tion. Only, therefore, when we get to the apprehension 
of the love of God to us in Christ, can we rise to the 
height whereon a man is disposed to count duty too 
small, and, disparaging his doing of that, to start off, and 

i Ibid, p. 176. 



THE PLOUGHING SERVANT. 413 

climb a steeper and loftier hill, at the impulse of grati- 
tude. Conscience will urge to duty, and will be con- 
tent with that, nay, will be complacent over that ; but 
love will constrain to something more than duty, and 
will never cease its exertions while they are needed or 
while it endures. And so, although the parable at first 
sight may seem to present God to us in a repulsive 
light, as a mere slave-master, we see, now that we have 
got to the end of it, that we can comply with its re- 
quirements only when we attain to the apprehension of 
his love. Thus the allegory has as its unseen founda- 
tion, all the while, the very grace which it appears to 
ignore. I cannot say, " I am an unprofitable servant," 
until I am a redeemed man ; and when I am a redeemed 
man, I am no longer a mere servant, but a son, working 
for love, and not simply from a sense of duty. The 
Christian calling requires that we shall do more than 
others ; but then it gives us, in the love of Christ, a mo- 
tive which will not allow us to be content with doing 
just as others do. To get that motive, therefore, we 
must open our hearts to receive Christ's love. We 
must freely accept him and his salvation, and then that 
will enkindle in our souls a gratitude that will emanci- 
pate us from the thraldom of legal service, and impel us 
to offer unto God the constant devotion of a child. 

When the life of a beloved son is hanging in the bal- 
ance, no one can persuade his mother to take rest. 
You may tell her that others are watching, that every 
thing is being done that can be done, that it is her 
" duty " to take a respite ; but you might as well speak 
to the deaf, for she is his mother, and her mother-love 
will not let her be content with less than her own per- 
sonal ministry to her boy. But does she think then of 
doing merely her duty to him ? Is she measuring her 



414 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

conduct then by any standard of rectitude ? Nothing 
of the kind ! She has risen above all standards and all 
duty. She does just what her love impels her ; and all 
she does is so little able to content her, that she is only 
sorry she can do no more. Now, it will be the same 
with us and the service of God, if only we attain to 
love of him for what he is to us, and for what he has 
done for us in Christ. It will lift us above legalism, 
and make the mere doing of duty seem but meagre 
and unprofitable. It will keep us from murmuring, and 
preserve us from self-complacency ; for duty can be sat- 
isfied with its doings, but love can never do enough. 
"Thank God," said one in dying, "I have done my 
duty." "Alas!" says the expiring Christian, after all 
he has done, "I am an unprofitable servant." There is 
the difference between the two. Let us, then, get to this 
love of God in Christ, and the exactions of the Chris- 
tian life will not appal us, while the meeting of them 
will not puff us up ; for we shall have the courage to go 
forward to them, and the humility not to be complacent 
over them. And when our life on earth is done, just as 
here we felt all through that we could never do enough 
for Christ, we shall discover hereafter that Christ can 
never do enough for us ; that, as we have sought to serve 
him here, he will serve us there ; and that, as we con- 
stantly strove to honor him here, he will do immortal 
honor to us there. " For " — I revert to the other side, 
and quote again the words, and wonderful words they 
are — "he will gird himself, and make us to sit down 
to meat, and will come forth and serve us." 



THE IMPORTUNATE WIDOW. 415 



XXVII. 

THE IMPORTUNATE WIDOW, AND THE 
PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 

(Luke xvii. 13-21.) 

The parable of the importunate widow was designed 
to enforce the lesson that " men ought always to pray, 
and not to faint." But in order to see what these 
words specially refer to, we must go back upon the dis- 
course which is summarized in the latter portion of the 
chapter which immediately precedes. That discourse, 
as you will at once perceive, treats of the second per- 
sonal appearance of the Lord Jesus upon the earth ; and 
while dwelling upon the certainty of that event, it par- 
ticularly emphasizes these two things concerning it: 
namely, that it should be long delaj^ed, and that it 
should occur when it was least expected. There would 
be many times in the history of the church, when, con- 
tending with adversaries, and suffering injustice at the 
hands of their persecutors, its members should " desire 
to see one of the days of the Son of man," and should not 
see it ; but they were not to cease to expect or to pray 
for that great deliverance, because of its being so long 
deferred. It would surely come, and when it came it 
would bring a speedy issue out of all their troubles : 
therefore, at all times, and in all circumstances, they 
were to keep that great event in mind, and make its 
coming the object of their earnest supplication. 



416 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

This being the primary purpose for which the parable 
was spoken, we can see that the " praying always " here 
is a different thing from that which Paul had in his 
mind when he enjoined his readers to "pray without 
ceasing." That referred to the constant maintenance of 
a devotional spirit, so that the habitual attitude of the 
soul toward God should be one of prayer. But this 
describes the case of one who has been long making 
request for that which has not yet been granted, and it 
encourages him to continue in the presentation of his 
petition, in spite of its apparent uselessness. As Eders- 
heim has said, " The word c always ' must not be under- 
stood as if it meant continuously, but in the sense of 
under all circumstances, however apparently adverse, 
when it seems as if an answer could not come, and we 
are therefore in danger of 'fainting ' or becoming weary." x 
It is not that we should never be doing any thing else 
than praying for the coming of the Lord ; but that we 
should not allow any influences however depressing, or 
any delay however long, to keep us from continuing to 
pray for the appearing of our Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ. The Church on earth must never allow herself 
to become so hopeless and unbelieving, in regard to the 
second coming of her Lord, as to give up praying for 
that great consummation, when all her wrongs shall be 
redressed, and all her troubles shall be brought to a 
blessed and everlasting end. That is the great lesson 
of the parable, and it is to that the Saviour reverts 
when, as he concludes, he says, "Nevertheless, when 
the Son of man cometh shall he find that faith ? " for in 
the original, the article is used, and the reference is to 
such faith as will continue to the end looking and pray- 
ing for the coming of the Son of man " upon the earth." 

1 Life and Times of Jesus the Christ, vol. ii. p. 286. 



THE IMPORTUNATE WIDOW. 417 

Now, with this clear comprehension of the design of 
the parable in onr minds, let us proceed to its interpre- 
tation. We have here a widow, deprived of her nat- 
ural protector, and made the victim of an unscrupulous 
man's injustice. In her extremity she applies to the 
judge, but he too is without any principle. He is not 
only known by others as one who neither fears God 
nor regards man, but he absolutely glories in these 
things himself as if they constituted a title to greatness. 
He did just as it pleased him ; and it pleased him most 
to serve his own interests, to promote his own aggran- 
dizement, and to take his own ease. There was 
small hope, therefore, that he would care to right this 
widow's wrongs. She could bring no influence to bear 
upon him that was likely to move him, and she had 
no gold wherewith to bribe him. But she held at him 
with the persistence of one who was apparently deter- 
mined not to let him go until he did her justice. And 
at length she conquered; for he said, " Because this 
widow troubleth me, I will do her justice, lest by her 
continual coming she weary me." This last phrase has 
been rendered in the Revised Version, "lest she wear 
me out by her continual coming ; " and by the American 
Revisers, " lest at last by her coming she wear me out." 
But it is questionable, to me, if either of these expres- 
sions conveys the full force of the original. The word 
rendered " weary," or " wear," is literally " to strike 
under the eyes," 1 and seems to indicate that this judge 
felt that if he did not attend to the case of the widow, 
she would ultimately be tempted to violence. It was 
as if he had said, "She'll come to blows by and by;" 2 

1 The Greek is vttwttkx&j, and the verb signifies to give one a black 
eye, to disfigure the face. 

2 This is the view of Meyer. 



418 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

and it is not unlikely, as Goclet suggests, that there is a 
touch of humor in the term. In any case, the widow 
gains her cause at last through that very love of ease 
in the judge which at first prevented him from exam- 
ining into her case. 

Now, from this analysis of the parable, it is at once 
apparent that we have here not an allegory proper, but 
a simple story from which an argument is drawn. We 
must not say that the judge in any sense represents 
God, or that the widow is a type of what a suppliant 
should be. The very reverse is true ; and the force of 
the argument drawn by our Lord from the parable lies 
in the unlikeness of God to this unjust judge, and in 
the unlikeness of the true Christian suppliant to this 
widow. It is here just as it was in the case of the para- 
ble of the friend at midnight, with which this one has 
so much in common ; and the argument is not so much 
from the less to the greater, as from the worse to the 
better. It may be amplified into these words : " Hear 
what the judge of unrighteousness saith ; and shall not 
God — the Judge of righteousness, and the Father of 
his people — do justice to his elect, who cry to him 
night and day, not to tease and worry him by their en- 
treaties, but out of their love to him and confidence in 
him, though he delay long to interfere in their behalf? 
I tell you that he will do justice to them, and when he 
begins he will do it speedily ; for the day of the Lord 
will make short work with all who are his adversaries, 
and who have been the oppressors of his people." You 
observe that I have carried this argument through ; and 
that I have pointed a contrast between the widow, and 
the elect of God, as well as between the unjust judge, 
and God himself. I do not think that we are warranted 
to take this woman's importunity with the judge as a 



THE IMPORTUNATE WIDOW. 419 

pattern for our praying, any more than we are to take 
the judge's yielding to her at last as a type of God's 
answering of prayer. This woman was not a model 
suppliant. Her plan was to " browbeat " — for that is 
the exact idiomatic equivalent to the original word — 
the judge into giving her what she wanted. But that 
is no right spirit to cherish when we pray to God ; and 
the argument of the parable is, that if she succeeded by 
that plan, with such a judge, much more God's people, 
praying to him in filial love and reverence and confi- 
dence, will receive from him at length that which he 
has promised. 

I am the more particular to insist on this, because I 
am persuaded that multitudes among us have an en- 
tirely erroneous idea about this matter of what they 
call importunity in prayer. They imagine that if they 
will only hold at God, as a foolish child does at an in- 
dulgent parent, they will at last receive what they want, 
whatever it may be. They give the impression that 
they believe that the Lord is unwilling to bless them, 
and that they must wring favors out of him by force 
of importunity. They think, in other words, that they 
will be heard for their persistence in speaking to him. 
Now, the success of our prayers does not depend on 
any thing of that kind, and it is a libel on God to cher- 
ish the notion that he is reluctant to bless his children. 
Moreover, it is an entire perversion of the purpose of 
this parable, to take it as if meant to teach us that we 
shall get from God that which we want, provided only 
we " browbeat " him into giving it by our persistence. 
The inference from the parable is not that we shall be 
heard because we persevere in prayer ; but, rather, that 
we should persevere in prayer even when the answer 
appears to be long delayed, because it is God to whom 



420 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

we are praying, and we know that he is always willing 
to bless, and will ultimately give to us that which is 
best. 

The primary reference of this parable, as we have seen, 
is to the second coming of Christ, which would be so 
long delayed that the Church would be tempted to cease 
praying for it altogether ; but its principle is equally 
applicable to all cases in which believers, seeking for 
that which God has promised, are in danger of growing 
faint through weariness in waiting, or through unbelief. 
44 Wait on God." Let him take his own time ; and while 
you wait for that time, solace yourselves with devout 
and loving dependence on him as expressed in prayer. 
That is the true spirit of filial piety, and that will suc- 
ceed with God far, far better than the widow's method 
did with the unjust judge. The delay in answering 
prayer does not imply that God has forgotten either 
you or his promise ; therefore be not tempted by that 
delay to give up prayer altogether, or to lose your faith 
in God as the hearer of prayer. He has not overlooked 
you, and in his own time the answer will come in such 
a way as to convince you that all through he has been 
planning for your highest good. 

Such is the bearing of this parable on the subject of 
prayer. It admits that God may delay answering prayer, 
and it tells us what our demeanor should be under such 
an experience ; but it gives no explanation of the delay. 
Still, with the light which is thrown on the subject from 
other parts of the Scripture, we may see that oftentimes 
answers to prayer are deferred, in order that God's 
forbearance may be shown a little longer to those who 
are oppressing his people, if haply they may be led to 
repentance. Sometimes, too, the purpose of the delay, 
as in the cases of Jacob and of the Syrophcenician 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 421 

woman, is to foster and develop the faith and holiness 
of the suppliant ; while occasionally, as in the case of 
Job, it may be due to the fact that God designs, through 
the demeanor of the suppliant himself, to show how 
powerful his grace is to sustain, under the most trying 
circumstances, all who trust in him. But whatever 
may be the explanation of the delay, it is not either in 
God's lack of love to us, or in his unwillingness to bless 
us, or in his unfaithfulness to his promises ; and there- 
fore it should never tempt us to give up praying to 
him. His delay should not destroy our faith in him, 
but rather quicken it into livelier exercise ; and we 
should continue to pray, not because we shall be heard 
for our continuance, but because, in spite of his appar- 
ent indifference, we are sure that he continues to love 
us, and will certainly bless us. Not because we trust 
in our importunity, so called, but because we know his 
love and faithfulness, we should pray in all circum- 
stances, and never faint. 

But all is not prayer which calls itself by that name ; 
and in order to guard us against mistake in a matter of 
so much importance, the Lord proceeds to show what 
true prayer is, by letting us overhear two men at their 
devotions. The first is a Pharisee, who, like so many of 
his class, trusted in himself that he was righteous, and 
despised others. He took his position by himself in the 
temple ; but his prayer, if so we may call it, was merely 
a self-complacent soliloquy. He expressed no wants. 
He framed no petition. He simply rehearsed the num- 
ber of his religious observances, and recounted his good 
qualities. He thanked God indeed, in words : yet even 
while he was doing that, we can perceive that he was 
merely congratulating himself. But there was no con- 



422 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

sciousness of need, and none of the urgency of one 
who felt that unless God supplied his need he would 
be eternally undone. It was thus he spake : " God, I 
thank thee that I am. not as other men are, extortioners, 
unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice 
in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess." Here 
was nothing of devotion, or dependence, or any other 
religious emotion, — nothing but a trusting in himself, 
and a despising of others. 

The other suppliant was a publican, who, abashed in 
the presence of the Great Supreme, "stood afar off, and 
would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but 
smote upon his breast." His attitude was not assumed 
for effect, like that of the Pharisee, but was the natural 
expression given by his whole body to the feelings 
which were vibrating within him. For it is a mistake 
to suppose that a man speaks only by the tongue. His 
eyes, his face, his hands, all have been endowed with 
the power of expression ; and, when his heart is pro- 
foundly moved, the very posture which his body intui- 
tively and unconsciously assumes is an indication of the 
emotions which stir his soul. Hence the attitude and 
action of the publican, his bowed head, the smiting of 
his breast, as well as the place on which he stood, were 
just so many indices — all the more sincere because they 
were unstudied — of his profound humility. 

Equally apparent is his earnestness. Here was no 
playing at prayer. Here was no attempt, either, at 
making a prayer by elaborate phrase-mongering. This 
entreaty was born out of the emergency in which the 
man felt himself to be. It came forth, as one might 
say, of itself, without any thought on his part of how 
he would shape it; and just because of that, it took the 
best possible shape. There was no circumlocution about 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 4t22> 

it. He went at once to the heart of the matter, and 
condensed into one brief utterance the whole need of 
his soul, " God be merciful to me, the sinner." No one 
but a man in earnest could have done that. The gen- 
eral on a review day, when he and his troops are to go 
through all the manoeuvres of a military parade, may 
harangue his soldiers in a style of florid and high-sound- 
ing rhetoric ; but when they are on a real battle-field 
with the enemy in front of them, he can utter only a 
few burning words, yet these few are genuine, simple, 
direct, and therefore eloquent. When the heart is 
stirred, it speaks in telegrams. Its words then are 
winged ; and the more thoroughly it is stirred, the more 
arrowy do its exclamations become. " Lord, save me, I 
perish!" "Lord, help me!" "Lord, I believe, help 
thou mine unbelief ! " such are specimens of its pant- 
ing ejaculations in its times of agony; and such also 
was the fervid utterance of the publican in the case 
before us. One may say a great deal, and yet have 
little real prayer in his words ; and again, as here, one 
may be hardly able to utter a sentence, but there may 
be in that sentence the condensation of a whole 
liturgy. 

These are the characteristics of the two prayers in 
this parable, so far as they appear upon the surface. 
Indeed, that of the Pharisee was altogether on the 
surface, and therefore we need not trouble ourselves 
further about it; but if we would really comprehend all 
that the publican's implied, we must go a little deeper, 
and when we do so we may learn how it came that he 
" went down to his house justified rather than the other." 

I. For, in the first place, when we come to examine 
it, we find that it sprang out of deep conviction of sin. 



424 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

" God — me the sinner." These are the words which 
indicate the workings of the man's conscience ; and 
when we place them thus, side by side, we see how seri- 
ous a thing in his view sin really was. Many would re- 
strict that term to the designation of flagrant offences, 
and such deeds as affect a man's respectability in society ; 
others, reading the law of God as having reference only 
to outward acts, imagine that sin consists merely in 
overt wickedness ; while, in the view of not a few, sin 
is a mere misfortune, — a thing to be regretted as a 
calamity, but not involving personal blame. And there 
are some who, comparing themselves with their neigh- 
bors, think that there is little wrong with them at all. 
But when one has been enlightened in the knowledge 
of himself and of God's law, by the Holy Ghost, he has 
but one idea of the matter, and one estimate of himself. 
Behold it here! Sin, in this man's eyes, is rebellion 
against God. It is so, else why does he call on God at 
all ? He does not invoke society to wipe away the re- 
proach which it had written against the publican. He 
does not beg his fellow-men to receive him into their 
confidence and esteem. But he asks mercy from God, 
and he does so because he knows that it is against God 
that he has sinned, — against God, who had done more 
for him than ever earthly father did for a son ; against 
God, who had crowned him with his tender mercies and 
loving-kindnesses. The essence of sin, to him, is that it 
has dishonored God by outraging his law and insulting 
his love. And in so regarding sin he does not restrict 
it to actions. He sees God's law to be exceeding broad, 
including his thoughts and desires and disposition, as 
well as his outward conduct ; nay, such is his sense of 
the enormity of his own guilt, that he has nothing to 
say about his neighbors. The Pharisee, when he had 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN 425 

exhausted his panegyric upon himself, could not con- 
clude without a horizontal fling at the publican ; but 
the publican is so overwhelmed with his own sin, that 
he has no thought at the moment for others. It is al- 
most with him as if he were the only guilty one in the 
world ; for he says, " God be merciful to me the sinner.' 1 
Brethren, when a man is convinced thus of sin, he can- 
not but be abased ; when, in his guiltiness and ingrati- 
tude, he confronts himself thus with God in His purity 
and love, he cannot but exclaim, " Woe is me, for I am 
a man of unclean lips ! " " Behold, I am vile, and what 
shall I answer ? " " God be merciful to me the sinner ! " 

II. But, in the second place, this prayer sprang out of 
a sense of helplessness. Observe, it is a cry for mercy. 
Now let us see what is implied in that. Very clearly it 
evinces that in the suppliant's estimation there was 
nothing about himself, on the ground of which he could 
claim forgiveness. He does not ask for justice. He 
does not seek that any thing should be done for him, or 
given to him, as a debt or of right. He presumes not, 
like the Pharisee, to speak of his own merit. His cry 
is for mercy. He acknowledges the justice of his con- 
demnation. He admits, besides, that there is in him no 
cause or ground why the sentence under which he lies 
should not be executed upon him. He sues alone for 
mercy. Now, it is the same with every one of us : and 
the sooner we come to see that, it will be the better for 
us ; for if we ever obtain deliverance from God, it will 
not be because of any thing about ourselves, but simply 
from the free, unmerited favor 'of the Most High. We 
are to accept it as a gift, but we cannot claim it as a 
right. It is " not of works, lest any man should boast." 
This is a humbling doctrine, but it is the doctrine of 



426 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

God's book ; and it puts us all on a level, for, as Paul 
says, " There is no difference, for all have sinned and 
come short of the glory of God." l Before him every 
one of us deserves to perish ; and when we come to him 
each of us must renounce merit, and plead for mercy. 
Just here many falter. They want to have some 
of the credit of their own deliverance. They wish 
something to be allowed for their liberality to good ob- 
jects, something for their activity in benevolent enter- 
prises, something for the restraint which they have tried 
to put on their evil principles ; and then they will be 
content to receive the balance as a gratuity from God. 
But all such claims must be disavowed. " 'Tis from the 
mercy of our God that all our hopes begin." Now, merit 
and mercy are altogether incompatible : as Paul has put 
it, and we never can put it better, " if it be by grace, 
then it is no more of works, otherwise grace is no more 
grace ; but if it be of works, then it is no more grace, 
otherwise work is no more work." 2 " Not by works of 
righteousness which we have done, but according to his 
mercy he saved us." 3 To that mercy, then, we must 
make our plea ; for that we must cry in the spirit of 
these simple lines, — 

" Mercy, good Lord ! mercy I crave, 
This is the total sum ; 
For mercy, Lord, is all my suit : 
Lord, let thy mercy come." 

III. But now, finall}', this prayer was a cry of faith. 
So much is evident from the statement of the Lord that 
the publican went down to his house justified ; but in 
the petition itself, there is, to the reader of the original, 
a striking proof of the same thing. For, the term ren- 

1 Rom. iii. 22, 23. 2 Horn. xi. 6. 3 Tit. iii. 5. 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 427 

dered " be merciful " has in it a reference to atonement. 1 
It is a form of the same word which is used when 
the reconciliation of sinners to God, on the ground of 
sacrifice, is referred to throughout the Scriptures. It is 
the verb of which the Greek name which designated 
the blood-besprinkled " mercy-seat " is the cognate 
noun. It is allied to the word which is translated 
" propitiation " in the well-known passage, 2 " whom God 
hath set forth to be a propitiation ; " and also to that 
occurring in the First Epistle of John, 3 " He is the 
propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for 
the sins of the whole world." Now, the use of this 
term by the publican shows that he had in his mind a 
reference to sacrifice, and to the promises which God 
had made to the Jews in connection with the sprin- 
kling of the blood of the victim upon the mercy-seat. 
Besides, we must not forget that his prayer was offered 
in the temple, from the court of which every day there 
ascended the smoke of sacrifice both morning and 
evening. Doubtless, therefore, to Jehovah as he had 
there revealed himself, to Jehovah as dwelling between 
the cherubim and over the mercy-seat, this prayer was 
addressed. Whether the suppliant had any clear idea 
of the typical nature of these animal sacrifices ; whether 
he had even a glimpse of the great atonement that 
was to be made by Him " who was wounded for our 
transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities," — may 
be exceedingly doubtful; but the peculiarity of his 
language seems to prove that his faith took hold of the 
promises which God had made in connection with 
sacrifice. Now, it has to be the same with us yet: 
only, instead of the typical sacrifice and the typical 
mercy-seat, we have the true atonement, and the true 

1 It is i\da6riTi. 2 Horn, iii. 25. 3 1 John ii. 2. 



428 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

throne of grace : and when we come seeking mercy, 
we must come through Jesus Christ, grounding our 
hope of acceptance on the atonement which he has 
made on our behalf. We have no claim even on God's 
mercy, except in Christ. It is written. - God was in 
Christ reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing 
unto men their trespasses ; " l and if we would obtain 
that reconciliation, we must go into Christ to secure 
it. " In Christ," that is the common ground, if I niay 
so express it. whereon God and the sinner meet in 
reconciliation. All that war in the direction of men. 
God has come to meet us ; all that way in the direction 
of God. we must go to meet him : and when we meet 
him thus "in Christ." we have "redemption through his 
blood, even the forgiveness of sins." - Indeed, nowhere 
save in Christ has God revealed mercy to those who 
have violated law. In this regard the aspect of na- 
ture is often very terrible. There is nothing there 
but hard, remorseless, inflexible law. which comes 
down on every transgressor with unpitying penalty. 
Fire burns, even though it be a martyr that is in the 
flames. The tide flows remorselessly in. even though 
a maiden testifying to Jesus is chained to a stake fai 
within the flood-mark. Everywhere we look, their is 
law, and penalty for its violation, but not a trace of 
mercy to those by whom law is broken. You cannot 
see that in the evening sky, or on the face of ocean, 
or anywhere on the surface of the dry land. Nature 
may and does unfold God's power and wisdom ;. but not 
until he revealed himself "in Christ" could we learn 
any thing of his mercy. At the cross :: Calvary we 
see his justice and his mercy : his law. and his tender- 
ness to the law-breaker, equally conspicuous; justice 

i 2 Cor. v. 19. : Bpb L 7. 



THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 429 

satisfied to be merciful, and mercy exercised in justice. 
Here we understand fully the meaning of the mystic 
name proclaimed to Moses as he stood in the cleft 
of the rock : 1 " Jehovah, Jehovah, God merciful and 
gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and 
truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, 
transgression, and sin; and that will by no means 
clear the guilty." Yea, over that cross of agony, we 
may read in characters of light, all the brighter for 
the gloom out of which they shine, another inscription 
than that which Pilate wrote ; and it is this : " God so 
loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, 
that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but 
have everlasting life." 2 Here, then, O sinner, is the 
ground on which thy hope must rest. God hath spoken 
to thee in mercy, and promised thee forgiveness through 
the giving-up of his own Son on thy behalf. Come and 
take him at his word. Come and seek his mercy in this 
the way of his appointment. And come now, so that 
thou too, like this publican, mayst go down to-night to 
thy house justified, accepted, saved. 

It has not been possible, even in this brief and 
comprehensive manner, to treat the publican's prayer, 
without preaching the gospel from it to sinners gen- 
erally. But we must not forget, that as it stands here 
contrasted with the self-laudation of the Pharisee, it 
is, in a sense, a model for ourselves ; and we must for 
just a moment or two return to look at it in that 
aspect, and see what we may learn from it as to how 
we are to pray. The attitude and words of the Phari- 
see warn us against pride, self-confidence, and arrogant 
boasting of ourselves over others, in our approaches to 

1 Exod. xxxiv. 6. 2 John iii. 16. 



430 THE PABABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

God. These things are not prayer at all. They have 
nothing in them that is devotional. They are simply 
and only sins, and. as such, must be an abomination to 
God. But if we would pray aright, we must draw 
near to God as sinners, with humility and earnestness ; 
we must seek those things which we feel we need ; 
and we must in seeking them make our appeal to God's 
mercy, as that has been revealed to us through the 
sacrifice of his Son on our behalf, and exxu'essed in 
the promises which his Word contains. That will be 
true prayer ; and though the answer may be at times 
delayed, we must not lose our faith hi God's love and 
fidelity, but wait in patience, because we know that 
we are waiting upon God. Pray like the publican, 
and wait like Abraham, whose whole life was one great, 
patient, prayerful expectation ; and who died •• not 
having received the things promised," but seeing them 
and saluting them from afar. That is the lesson which 
we are to learn from the two parables of this evening's 
study. 



THE POUNDS 431 



XXVIII. 

THE POUNDS. 

(Luke xix. 12-37.) 

Rightly to understand this parable, and give their 
due significance to those features in it which differ 
from that of the talents, to which it has a general 
resemblance, it is essential that we give good heed to 
the circumstances in which, and the purpose for which, 
it was spoken. Our Lord had just been entertained 
by Zacchseus, one of the chief of the publicans in the 
city of Jericho, and was about to proceed to Jerusalem 
on the occasion of that passover to which he had so 
often referred as destined to be the crisis of his earthly 
career. He was attended by a crowd, the members of 
which were differently affected by these movements on 
his part. The Pharisees, of course, were utterly out 
of sympathy with his treatment of the tax-gatherer. 
They were indignant that he had accepted the hospi- 
tality of one who belonged to a class which they de- 
spised ; and, whoever might be disposed to accept him 
as a king, they utterly repudiated his claim to royalty 
over them, and gave him to understand that they would 
never own his authority. 

On the other hand, his own disciples were looking 
forward with high hopes to his visit to Jerusalem at 
this time. They trusted that it was he who should 
redeem Israel, and eagerly anticipated that he would 



432 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

now unfurl his standard, and gather round him those 
by whose means he would deliver the chosen people 
from a foreign yoke, and restore the kingdom of David 
to its ancient glory. Their idea of the kingdom of God 
was that of a splendid temporal dominion, and they 
had the belief that now it was immediately to appear. 

Round these two parties, the units in the multitude 
mainly ranged themselves ; while there were, perhaps, 
a few in the crowd, who were there merely out of curi- 
osity, and did not concern themselves at all either about 
Jesus or his work. 

It was to meet these various states of mind among 
his hearers, that the Lord spake the parable before 
us. The story is one which a well-known event in 
their recent national history would help them all to 
appreciate. Indeed, it may have been in part suggested 
to the mind of the Redeemer by his proximity to the 
palace of Archelaus, which was in the neighborhood 
of Jericho; for, on the death of Herod the Great, that 
prince went to Rome to obtain from Augustus the 
ratification of his father's will, and was followed thither 
by an embassy from Judaea, appointed by the citizens, 
who, wearied of a dynasty of adventurers, desired of 
the emperor that their country might be converted into 
a Roman province. Now, every one can see that in 
these historical incidents we have much that is parallel 
to the framework of this story. In the parable, how- 
ever, the new feature is introduced, that the nobleman 
intrusted certain of his servants with sums of money, 
which they were to trade with on his account in his 
absence ; and then, on his return, he held a reckoning 
with them similar in almost every respect to that which 
we have already had before us in the parable of the 
talents. 



THE POUNDS 433 

Now, in the light of the statements which we have 
made, it is not difficult to perceive the peculiar perti- 
nence of some of the points in this beautiful but sol- 
emn allegory. The nobleman is the Lord Jesus Christ 
himself ; the far country is heaven, to which Christ has 
gone to await the consummation of that kingdom which 
he receives from his Father ; the pound is the common 
privilege of the gospel, which is conferred alike on all 
those to whom it is proclaimed ; and the return of the 
nobleman is the second coming of the Lord, when he 
shall at the final judgment take account of all to whom 
his Word has been preached. These are the main lines 
of exposition ; but, as we dwelt at sufficient length on 
most of them in our enforcement of the lessons taught 
by the parable of the talents, we shall not linger over 
them now. We content ourselves, rather, with bring- 
ing out some of the distinctive features which belong 
to this of the pounds. 

Now, here, in the first place, the departure of the 
nobleman to the far country, and his sojourn there 
until he should receive his kingdom, intimate that the 
second coming of the Lord was not to be immediate. 
The whole trend of the story is in the direction of the 
idea that a long while was to elapse before his return to 
earth as King of kings and Lord of lords. It is, there- 
fore, somewhat marvellous in our eyes, that after the 
repeated references to that fact, which the Lord had 
made, the early Christians should have fallen into the 
very mistake of those here mentioned, who thought 
that the kingdom of God was immediately to appear. 
But so it was : and the error led them into two differ- 
ent — I might almost say opposite — evils. On the one 
hand, expecting the speedy re-appearance of the Lord, 



434 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

and yet disappointed by his lengthened delay, some 
were tempted to break through all restraint, and to 
act as if he would never come at all. Like the dis- 
loyal servant, who began to say, " My lord delayeth his 
coming," and proceeded to "smite his fellow-servants, 
and to eat and drink with the drunken," they gave 
themselves to excesses of every sort, and virtually threw 
off their allegiance to him. Just as those who have taken 
up the erroneous opinion that God has promised to 
answer literally every prayer presented in Christ's name, 
are stumbled when they do not obtain what they re- 
quest, and sometimes rush to the extreme of unbelief, 
alleging that there is no efficacy in prayer at all ; so, 
their anticipation of the immediate re-appearance of 
Christ being frustrated, they went on to the denial that 
he would ever come, saying, " Where is the promise of 
his coming ? " It was against these, as you remember, 
that Peter wrote his second epistle, in which he re- 
affirmed with great positiveness, that "the day of the 
Lord should come as a thief in the night." On the 
other hand, there were those whose belief in the im- 
mediate re-appearance of Christ was so strong, that 
they could do nothing either in the way of self-cul- 
ture, or of work, whether secular or sacred, because of 
their constant outlook for his approach. This was the 
case with some of the Thessalonians, who actually gave 
up laboring for their own support, in the expectation 
that there would be no need for any such action on 
their part, since the Lord was just at the door. 

But both of these classes might have been preserved 
from their eccentric courses if they had been careful to 
mark what the Lord's teaching on this subject precisely 
was ; for, while he always spoke most unqualifiedly of 
the act of his coming again as certain, he invariably 



THE POUNDS. 435 

indicated that the time of it would be uncertain, only 
he made it clear, as in the case of this parable, that it 
would not be immediate. 

Thus the history of the early Christians in regard to 
this matter is strikingly suggestive, as showing the con- 
nection between erroneous doctrinal belief and laxity of 
life in one respect or other. They first misunderstood 
the Lord, and then, as the result, dishonored him; and if 
we mean to adorn his doctrine, we must make sure first 
that what we believe is precisely what he taught. Ex- 
travagant expectations of him or from him, for which 
there is no warrant in his Word, have often led to utter 
disbelief in him, or to conduct which he most emphat- 
ically condemns. And in these days, when so much that 
is utterly unwarranted is said regarding answers to 
prayer, it is well that this truth should be kept in mind 
by all ; for I greatly fear that the exaggerated asser- 
tions that are made by many, in regard to healing by 
prayer, and so called faith-cures, will yet be responsible 
for an amount of infidelity that will startle the apostles 
of this new anomaly. Be sure, therefore, that what you 
believe as the doctrine of Christ is that which he really 
taught ; and especially, in regard to his second coming, 
be on your guard against either attempting to fix its 
date, or to prescribe its manner, for neither of these 
has he thought proper to reveal. 

We may note, again, that in the light of this parable 
the true preparation for the coming of the kingdom 
of the Lord is that of character. The disciples, at this 
time, had the idea that their Lord was to be a mere lit- 
eral successor to the throne of David. They had no 
notion whatever of the spirituality of his kingdom ; but 
dreamed that he was to be an earthly monarch, and 



THE PARABLES OF 01' E 8AVIOUB. 

that they were to be the members of his cabinet. Now, 
the fact that the nobleman in this parable is repre- 
sented as giving to each of his servants a pound to 
3 with on his account was well calculated to rectify 
their views on this important subject. For. by that 
trading these servants ~ :uld reveal of what sort they 
were, and show their fitness or the reverse for positions 
in the kingdom of their master. They all received the 
same sum: and the different degrees of improvement 
which they made of that would indicate the qualities 
which they severally possessed, while the very use of 
these qualities would develop them into larger excel- 
lence. The things they did in their lord's absence 
would not be the same as those which they would be 
set to do when he returned, but in their larger and 
more important field they would need the very same 
characTri:-:::- which were required in the smaller; and 
the fact that such qualir:— as prudence, faithfulness, 
energy, and activity, and not the military virtues of 
drill, Diai^r n r. and the like, would be required there, 
proves that the kingdom itself was not to be of an ordi- 
nary son. As Bruce has well said here, the end : _.- 
templated by this nobleman "is not money-making, but 
character-making, the development in his servants of a 
hardihood of temper and a firmness of will which can 
be turned to good account when the obscure traders 
shall have been transformed into distinguished rulers." - 
So the design of Christ, luring his absence from the 
earth, is that his followers shall be trained in charac- 
ter for the future that is before them when he shall 
come in his kingdom. For this purpose he has given 
each l i : that is. the common blessing of the ; : 8- 

pel and its opportunities. The talents were different 

1 Parabolic Teaching of Christ, p. — 



THE POUNDS. 437 

for each, but the pound is the same for all ; and so it 
aptly symbolizes that gospel which preaches the same 
truth to the rich and to the poor, to the learned and to 
the ignorant, to the old and to the young ; which tests 
the character of all to whom it is proclaimed ; and 
which wherever it is belie vingly received, and in the 
proportion in which it is obeyed, is the great educator 
of the soul for eternal excellence in the heavenly king- 
dom. In the interval between his disappearance and 
his re-appearing, Christ has given us his Word ; and our 
work is to make the best of that Word for the formation 
of ourselves, so that he may know what we shall be most 
aptly fitted for at the consummation of his coming. 

Now, bearing these things in mind, we shall find in 
this parable, when we examine it minutely, four differ- 
ent ways of dealing with this pound, and the lord who 
gave it. 

I. First of all, there is that illustrated by the good 
and faithful servant who made his one pound into ten. 
He took it, small as it was, and made the very best 
possible improvement of it, so that he increased it 
tenfold. So, when his lord returned, he received this 
commendation and reward : " Well, thou good servant ; 
because thou hast been faithful in a very little, have 
thou authority over ten cities." Now, this symbolizes 
the conduct and blessedness of those who make the 
most of their enjoyment of the gospel blessings. They 
do not despise the day of small things. They do not 
trifle away their time in idleness, or waste it in sin ; 
but finding salvation in the gospel, through faith in 
Jesus Christ, they set themselves to turn every occupa- 
tion in which they are engaged, and every providential 
dispensation through which they may be brought, to 



438 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

the highest account, for the development in them of 
the Christian character. They " exercise themselves to 
keep a conscience void of offence toward God and 
toward men ; " they make strenuous efforts after god- 
liness; they give all diligence to "add to their faith 
courage, and to their courage knowledge, and to their 
knowledge temperance, and to their temperance pa- 
tience, and to their patience godliness, and to their 
godliness brotherly kindness, and to their brotherly 
kindness charity." 1 They labor not for their own 
sanctification merely, but for the welfare of their fellow- 
men. And they do all these things in humble depend- 
ence on the help of the Holy Spirit ; so that at last, with 
their one pound multiplied to ten, they have ministered 
to them an entrance abundantly into the everlasting 
kingdom of their Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. 
These are the "choice" specimens of the Christian char- 
acter and life ; believers like Paul and saints like John, 
who, having rilled up their lives with devotion to their 
Lord, receive at last the highest measure of reward at 
his hands. This servant obtained authority over ten 
cities; but the form of the reward in the parable is 
determined by the fact that the nobleman went to 
receive an earthly kingdom, and we get no light from 
it as to the nature of the reward which Christ will 
give at last to those whom he delights to honor. All it 
tells us is that the degree of the reward, whatever be 
its nature, will be determined by the fidelity of the 
disciple in his present sphere, and the result of that 
upon his character and work. Perhaps full often this 
noble one had bemoaned his shortcomings and infirmi- 
ties, his lack of energy and his slowness of heart, say- 
ing, "Alas, I am an unprofitable servant." But his 

i Acts xxiv. 16 ; 1 Tim. iv. 7 ; 2 Pet. i. 5-7. 



THE POUNDS. 439 

master did not so depreciate him. 'N&y, rather, he 
greeted him with heartiest congratulation, saying, 
" Well, thou good servant." What a blessing if we 
shall be found worthy to be thus addressed ! 

II. But another way of dealing with the common 
blessing of the gospel is illustrated in the case of him 
who had increased his pound to five. He had been a 
real servant; but his diligence had been less ardent, his 
devotion less thorough, his activity less constant, and 
so the lord simply said to him, " Be thou also over five 
cities." Here, you observe, were no special words of 
commendation. He is not called a "good servant." It 
is not even said that he had done well. It was good 
that he had done so much, but if he had chosen he 
might have done much more ; and so he becomes the 
representative of the easy-going disciple, who is admit- 
ted to be a true disciple, but has not felt, to the same 
degree as " first-rate " Christians feel, the constraining 
influence of the love of Christ. He had not kept such 
close watch over himself as they had done. He had not 
given the same diligence to the great work of character- 
making as they had devoted. He had not so concen- 
trated himself on the one thing of following after Christ 
as they had done. And so he had less to show for his 
labor. He had made less of his opportunities, therefore 
he received a smaller reward. 

Here, as I have already hinted, is the great dis- 
tinction between the teaching of this parable, and that 
of the parable of the talents. In the latter, we are 
taught that equal improvement of unequal talents shall 
have an equal proportionate reward; but in this we 
are informed that unequal improvement of the same 
trust shall have an unequal reward. So he who had 



440 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

made the one pound into ten may be held as sym- 
bolizing those who receive an "abundant entrance;" 
this one who made the one pound into no more than 
five may be regarded as representing such as receive 
merely an entrance, without any thing of the " abun- 
dantly " connected therewith. There are some who will 
be saved yet so as by fire, and others who shall have 
salvation in fulness ; 1 some w T ho shall have little per- 
sonal holiness on which to graft the life of the future, 
and who shall thus be in a lower place in heaven for 
evermore, enjoying its blessedness as thoroughly as 
they are competent to do, yet having there a position 
analogous it may be, though of course not at all identi- 
cal, with that occupied by the Gideonites of old in the 
promised land. 

On that drizzly morning when the corn-ship stranded 
on the Maltese shore, all the passengers and crew 
got safely to land; they had all an entrance into 
Malta: but there was little of abundance in that en- 
trance, for some of them floated ashore on broken 
pieces of the wreck. How different such a landing, 
from that given to a prince when he goes to visit a 
loyal portion of his dominions ! Amid the enthusiastic 
cheers of the multitude, accompanied by the thunder of 
cannon aud the stirring strains of martial music, he is 
welcomed by the greatest of the place, and led by them 
through streets festooned with flowers, and gay with 
fluttering flags, to the banqueting-house that has been 
prepared for his reception. That is an " abundant " 
entrance. Such, and so different, will be the welcomes 
given to those servants who have done their very best 
for Christ, and those, who, while truly his disciples, 
have built wood, hay, and stubble, instead of precious 

1 See Binney's great sermon so entitled, in Weyhouse Sermons. 



THE POUNDS. 441 

stones, into the fabric which they have erected on the 
one great foundation. 

This man who had the five pounds was not so low 
down in the scale as many. Perhaps he was higher 
than any one of us. Yet let the difference between 
his Lord's words to him, and to the servant who had 
the ten pounds, stir us up to renewed diligence in 
the cultivation of the spiritual life, and the further- 
ance of the gospel of Christ, both in ourselves and 
in the world. There is a wrong humility, which in- 
deed is not humility at all, but slothfulness, in many, 
concerning this matter. " Oh, " say they, " it will be 
enough for us, if we but get within the door of the 
celestial mansion ; " and no doubt that will be eternally 
better than to be shut out entirely. But the choi- 
cest Christians are those who desire to be nearest 
Christ ; and if we would get such places, we must not 
be content with a bare increase of our pound, but must 
seek to multiply it manifold. Ah ! but that is a serious 
matter ; and those who start out to attain that end had 
need to ponder well the question put by the Lord to 
the sons of Zebedee, when they sought similar honor, 
" Can ye drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and be 
baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with ? " 1 
Only thus and thereby can we make the one pound into 
the largest possible sum, and so secure the " well done," 
and the seat on the right hand. 

III. But the third mode of dealing with the common 
privilege of the gospel is illustrated by the servant who 
hid his pound in the earth, after he had carefully sought 
to keep it from being injured, by wrapping it in a napkin. 
As one has said, " He thought it was enough, to do no 

i Matt. xx. 23. 



442 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

harm. He lost every thing by an unbelieving anxiety 
to lose nothing. He was so afraid of doing any thing 
amiss, that he did nothing at all. He would make no 
venture, and run no risk, even when his master bade him. 
His was not a case of over-conscientiousness: it was 
an instance of sloth and selfishness taking the thread- 
bare dress of superior prudence." 1 To add to his folly, 
though it was also the explanation of it, he gave as his 
excuse, that he feared the austerity of his master, who, 
he alleged, " took up that which he had not laid down, 
and reaped that which he did not sow." Now, as we 
saw when treating the parable of the talents, that 
statement, even if it had been true, would not avail ; 
for then his prudence ought to have impelled him to 
secure interest for the pound. But it was not true, 
and therefore he only added insult to unfaithfulness by 
making such a plea. So he stands as the representa- 
tive of the great multitude of hearers of the gospel, 
who simply do nothing whatever about it. They do 
not oppose it; they do not laugh at it; they do not 
argue against it; their worst enemies would not call 
them immoral : but they " neglect the great salvation," 
and think that because, as they phrase it, they have 
done no harm, therefore they are in no danger. But 
Christ requires positive improvement of the privileges 
which he bestows. He gives the seed, not to be hoarded 
in the granary, but to be scattered over the field that 
it may be multiplied many-fold; and though it may not 
seem so at first, yet the keeping of it in the granary 
is as really a disobedience of him, as would be the 
emptying of it out into the sea. 

Negative excellence, even if that were ours, is not 
positive obedience. Innocence is not virtue. Virtue is 

1 The Parables of Jesus, by Rev. James Wells, p. 352. 



THE POUNDS. 443 

innocence tempted yet triumphant, tried and so proved ; 
and therefore, when Christ seeks virtue, it will not be 
enough to give him innocence. But, alas ! who are we, 
that we should talk of giving him innocence? That 
we are guilty, is the very reason why he has come to us 
with the gospel. What folly, therefore, on our part, to 
neglect that by which alone we can be saved from guilt, 
and built up in holiness, and then think to excuse our- 
selves by saying that we have done no harm ! Oh, if 
there be any here to-night, who have been acting in this 
way, let them see how utterly irrational their conduct is, 
and let them dig up their buried pound, and shake it out 
of their napkin, and proceed at once to use it for the 
glory of their Lord. Study these Gospels. Get faith 
in Him of whom they tell. Accept his principles. 
Obey his precepts. Build your lives after his example. 
And then, if you may not get the reward of him who 
had the ten pounds, you may perhaps attain to that of 
him who had the five; and, at all events, you will 
escape the doom of him who, stripped of his hidd 
trust, was thrust out into disgrace. 

IV. But now, finally, we have a fourth mode of dealing 
with the gospel and its Lord, symbolized in the conduct 
of those citizens who hated the nobleman, and said, 
" We will not have this man to reign over us." These 
were the open enemies of him who went to receive his 
kingdom ; and they represent those who defy the Lord 
Jesus, and set themselves against his cause. They 
make a merit of their frankness. When you speak to 
them of the claims of Christ upon them, they reply that 
there is nothing of the hypocrite about them. They 
do not pretend to be what they are not; they will 
have nothing to do with our Christ, and they will go 



444 THE PARABLES OF OUR SAVIOUR. 

their own way in spite of him. Who is he, that he 
should demand their obedience ? Thus they are very 
decided, and very pronounced ; and they think that 
they are better than he was who took the pound, and 
hid it. But are they? In the light of this parable we 
must say, No. For the man with the one pound was 
punished by the forfeiture of that pound, while these 
enemies were slain. A man is not the less Christ's 
enemy because he is an open and armed enemy. The 
avowal does not change the enmity into friendship. 
He is an enemy, and defies Christ. That is the simple 
truth. And here is the result : " Those mine enemies 
which would not that I should reign over them, bring 
hither, and slay them before me;" the meaning of 
which is thus resolved by Paul : " They that obey not 
the gospel of Christ shall be punished with everlasting 
destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from 
the glory of his power, when he shall come to be glori- 
fied in his saints, and to be admired among all them that 
believe." 1 Oh, why will you recklessly rush, my unbe- 
lieving and disobedient friend, on such a doom ? Con- 
sider your ways, I entreat you, and let your enmity to 
Christ give place forthwith to simple trust in him and 
sincere love for him. And thus you will secure at 
length an entrance into his kingdom. 



We have come to-night to the end of our study of 
the Eedeemer's parables. For twenty-eight sabbath 
evenings we have been engaged together in the pleasant 
and profitable work ; and as we have gone on, we have 
had deeper insight into the heart of our Master, and 
glimpses into regions of truth, which, perhaps, were 

i 2 Tbess. i. 8-10. 



THE POUNDS. 445 

heretofore unknown by us. When I began, I feared 
that the way had been so frequently trodden, that little 
freshness would be found in it by us. I thought of my 
work as that of a belated gleaner in a well-raked field. 
But it has been far otherwise ; and I know not if from 
any of our winter studies in the word of God, whether 
of the Old Testament or the New, we have gathered in 
so many sheaves of golden grain as we have done dur- 
ing these past months from the exposition of these ex- 
quisite stories. It is an affecting thought, to me, that 
some of those who began the investigation of them with 
us are now no longer in this earthly sphere, but have 
gone into that region which awaits us all. They 
have now the key to much that is still mysterious to 
us here ; and their removal is a loud warning to us all 
to improve the passing opportunities so that we may gain 
at last the "well done," with which, as I trust, they 
have been greeted. Do not let us forget that these 
studies have increased our responsibilities, and that if 
we are not the better for them we must inevitably be 
the worse. We have been very near the Saviour all the 
while. Have we learned thereby to love Him more ? or 
must it be with any of us as with that disciple, who 
heard all the parables at the first, and yet went " to his 
own place " at last ? " Now unto Him that is able to 
keep you from falling, and to present you faultless 
before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to 
the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, 
dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen." 



























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